EUROMENTOR JOURNAL STUDIES ABOUT EDUCATIONeuromentor.ucdc.ro/en/EUROMENTORvo3nr1march2017.pdfEUROMENTOR JOURNAL 9 operational technologies and processes4, meanwhile another definition

EUROMENTOR JOURNAL STUDIES ABOUT EDUCATION

Volume VIII, No.1/March 2017

VOLUME VII, NO. 1/MARCH 2016 2

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EUROMENTOR JOURNAL 3

EUROMENTOR JOURNAL STUDIES ABOUT EDUCATION

Volume VIII, No. 1/March 2017

VOLUME VII, NO. 1/MARCH 2016 4

ISSN 2068-780X

Every author is responsible for the originality of the article and that the text was not published previously.


CONTENTS

PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL SCIENCES

THE MODERN UNIVERSITY AS A KNOWLEDGE AND TECHNOLOGICAL TRANSFER INSTITUTION. THE CASE OF ROMANIA .......................................................................................................... 7

IRINA ION, ELENA NICOLAE

PEDAGOGICAL ACTIVITY OF UNIVERSITY LECTURER IN THE CONDITIONS OF HUMANIZATION ................................................. 17

ELENA MYSHAK

IT APPROACH TO THE EVALUATION OF THE PROFESIONAL SKILLS OF UNIVERSITY GRADUATES ................................................... 25

ALEXANDR КАNIVETS, VLADISLAV NIZEGORODTCEV

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IN TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP FOR PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES ................................................................................................ 35

DUMITRU VALERIU

THE MENTAL TABLEAU ............................................................................. 52

ZENO GOZO

THE REASON WHY STUDENTS CHOOSE COMMUNICATION AND PUBLIC RELATIONS FACULTIES ................................................... 84

ILARION ŢIU

WE ARE WHAT WE LEARN: STUDIES AS A FUNCTION OF IDENTITY IN ADULT EDUCATION ......................................................... 107

CRİSTİNA NİCOLAESCU

VOLUME VIII, NO. 1/MARCH 2017 6

PERSONAL AXIOGENESIS OF FIREFIGHTERS AND RESCUERS IN THE CONDITIONS OF SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS ................. 112

V.I. VUS, S.M. KRAVCHUK

TRAINING OF TEACHERS-REALITIES AND PERSPECTIVES ........ 121

TATIANA NAGNIBEDA – TVERDOHLEB STUDY ON THE BARRIERS AND SUPPORT FOR PARTICIPATION TO SOCIAL LIFE OF CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES ............................................................................................... 130

ANDREI DUMITRU

HISTORY AND EDUCATION CONSTANTIN IPSILANTI’S CONTRIBUTIONS TO OTTOMAN MILITARY REFORM ................................................................................... 149

ZEYNEP SÖZEN


THE MODERN UNIVERSITY AS A KNOWLEDGE AND TECHNOLOGICAL TRANSFER INSTITUTION. THE CASE

OF ROMANIA

IRINA ION,

[email protected]

ELENA NICOLAE

[email protected]

Abstract: Effective technological transfer impacts directly and positively on several societal actors. Private companies are likely to increase productivity, competitiveness and durability, based on more awareness on external sources of innovation, increased R&D spending, transfer of tacit and explicit knowledge, innovative products. Universities and research institutes are more likely to become more entrepreneurial, more connected to the market needs, but also better equipped to serve the social purpose of generating social and economic welfare. Also, universities can offer their students more chances of integration to the labour market, by linking market needs with academic and scientific research. Technological transfer also produces positive externalities for the citizens, non-lucrative private organizations and governmental bodies, in terms of improved social and business models, products and living conditions.

This paper aims to highlight the importance of universities in playing an active part in the process of knowledge and technological transfer and their role as facilitators in this process.

Keywords: Knowledge transfer, Technology transfer, competition, innovation. Introduction The role of universities today is fundamentally different than it was

in medieval times when they first started to be founded. Nowadays, the modern university has many different objectives among which:

Lecturer, Faculty of International Business and Economics, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Bucharest.

Lecturer, Faculty of International Business and Economics, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Bucharest.


a) The need to generate mass education, as more people have had access to higher education starting with the 1950’s

b) The need to boost and support research, development and innovation programmes

The new roles of higher education are compatible, some considering education to be an industry which is actually returning to its genuine roots of knowledge institution1.

The transition to a knowledge based economy started in the 1990’s being first experimented in Western societies. The most important factors that have influenced the knowledge based economy are the rapid development of information and communication technologies, more affordable transportation, political liberalisation, economic deregulation measures and more liberal reforms from planned economies. Furthermore, the acceleration of knowledge production, increasing the share of intangible capital at micro - and macroeconomic level and also the magnitude of corporations that sell essentially information, expertise, economies of scale and management should be added as contributing factors2.

The new economic dynamic, which is also found in modern theories of economic growth based on innovation, needs social actors who can produce and manage research and development processes. The most well prepared and capable organisations to undertake this process are modern universities. From this point of view, universities receive the role of knowledge and technological transfer institutions in any economy that wishes to develop itself in a sustainable way through innovation and a more educated and skilled human capital.

Literature review: The knowledge and technological transfer The technology transfer involves the movement of technology from the site

of origin to the site of use and the acceptance and use of the technology by the end user3. Technology is the know-how about the transformation of

1 Giarini, O.; Maliţa, M., The Double Spiral of Education and Work (Dubla spirală a

învățării și muncii), Bucharest, Comunicare.ro Publishing House, 2005, p. 45 2 Ion, I., The Business Environment: Navigation guide. New Perspectives on analysing the

external environment of companies (Lumea afacerilor: ghid de navigare. Noi perspective de analiza a mediului extern al firmei), Bucharest, ASE Publishing House, 2015, p. 47 – 69.

3 Johnson, S., Gatz, E., and Hicks, D., Expanding the content base of technology education: technology transfer as a topic of study. Journal of Technology Education, 8 (2), 1997, p.38.


operational technologies and processes4, meanwhile another definition identifies technology as the wealth of nations5. Currently, technological development is changing the business and economic paradigms, a context in which technology management becomes of primary importance for entrepreneurs, managers and researchers.

Technology transfer is always doubled by a knowledge transfer, which is both a formal, planed process and an unstructured one, occurring during daily work based on the transfer of tacit knowledge6.

There are many popular models of technology and knowledge transfer, such as the appropriability model, the dissemination model, the knowledge utilization model, the contextual collaboration model, the material transfer model, the design transfer model or the capacity transfer model7.

Effective technological transfer impacts directly and positively on several societal actors. Private companies are likely to increase productivity, competitiveness and durability, based on more awareness on external sources of innovation, increased R&D spending, transfer of tacit and explicit knowledge, innovative products. Universities and research institutes are more likely to become more entrepreneurial, more connected to the market needs, but also better equipped to serve the social purpose of generating social and economic welfare. Also, universities can offer their students more chances of integration to the labour market, by linking market needs with academic and scientific research. Technological transfer also produces positive externalities for the citizens, non-lucrative private organizations and governmental bodies, in terms of improved social and business models, products and living conditions.

4 Sexton, M.; Barrett, P., The role of technology transfer in innovation within small

construction firms, Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, Vol. 11 Iss: 5, 2004, p.345.

5 Ayres, R. U., Barriers and breakthroughs: an “expanding frontiers” model of the technology-industry life cycle, Technovation, 7(2), 1988, p. 86

6 Chen, J., & McQueen, R.J., Knowledge transfer processes for different experience levels of knowledge recipients at an offshore technical support center. Information Technology & People, 23(1), 2010, p. 62.

7 Choi, H.J., Technology transfer issues and a new technology transfer model. Available at https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JOTS/v35/v35n1/choi.html, 2009.


Innovation and knowledge and technological transfer in Romania Romania is also part of the global competitiveness race but

unfortunately economic development based on innovation is in its early stages. There are two well-known reports in the field of innovation and competitivity that prove this.

First of all, the World Competitiveness Report 2016-2017 reveals that Romania is in a transition stage from an efficiency driven economy to an innovation driven one.

Its main challenges are the lack of business sophistication and that of a functional innovation system.

In Figure 1 we present the rank of each sub-pillar of the overall Innovation pillar from the model that the World Economic Forum uses to assess the competitiveness of countries:

Figure 1. Innovation assessment in Romania

Source: World Competitiveness Report 2016-2017, World Economic Forum NB: The rank is from 1- 138 (138 economies were included in the study),

with rank 138 - the worst rank, 1- the best rank. Secondly, according to the Innovation Union Scoreboard 2016,

elaborated by the European Commission, Romania is a modest innovator at EU level, ranking 35 out 36 countries (EU and neighbouring countries). The Report highlights that innovation performance increased until 2010, after which it has been declining. According to this research, Romania’s main problems are the lack of cooperation between the private business environment and the research and academic environment, low SMEs product/process innovation, low R&D expenditures in the business sector and the absence of a functional technology transfer system.

There causes behind this situation are many, one of them being the


fact that there are almost no institutions that ensure knowledge and technological transfer.

There is a lack of culture for knowledge and technological transfer at national level and also there is a lack of specialists, educational programmes and public policies in the field.

Academically, there are just few Romanian books and articles in the field8. The existing studies, with few exceptions, are mostly build on international expertise and are not adapted enough to the Romanian peculiarities. Also, the majority of existing studies are the result of the demand of public governmental bodies. The studies are built on a macroeconomic perspective, are generally descriptive, explaining concepts, processes and indicators, as they serve to the primary need of building a system for technological transfer. Among other deficiencies, these studies underestimate: a) the importance of universities in the technological transfer and their characteristics, b) the impact of internal, managerial and organizational factors of companies, c) the general importance of knowledge and technological transfer organizations in the technological transfer practices, d) the need of various stakeholders to have access to practical models and instruments, in the form of good practices, case studies, good lessons, methodological frameworks that can inspire the process in Romania.

In what concerns foreign academic research on Romania, this is also scarce, with few exceptions9. The majority of studies focus on the Western, developed countries or Japan, China and Indonesia10.

8 Such as Hutu, A., (1999), Organizational culture and technology transfer, Bucharest,

Economic Publishing; Nicolae, M., 2013, Managing Organisational Innovation. The Road to Excellence (Managementul inovației organizaționale. Drumul spre excelență), Tritonic Publishing House; Nicolae, M., (coord.), Moulder, J., Lixandru, I., 2010, Managing Creativity, Bucharest, ASE Publishing House.

9 Such as Dyker, D. A., 1999, Foreign direct investment in the former Communist world: a key vehicle for technological upgrading?. Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, 12(3), 345-352. or Karkalakos, S., Regional technological differences: the case of southern European Union. The Journal of Technology Transfer, 2005, 30(3), 315-326.

10 Such as Frankema, E., & Lindblad, J.T., 2006, Technological development and economic growth in Indonesia and Thailand since 1950. ASEAN Economic Bulletin, 303-324.; Teasley, R., & Robinson, R., 2005, Understanding technology transfer effectiveness in Japanese organizations: A test of contingency theory. Academy of Strategic Management Journal, 4, 77; Zucker, L. G., & Darby, M. R., 2001, Capturing technological opportunity via Japan's star scientists: Evidence from Japanese firms' biotech patents and products. The journal of Technology transfer, 26 (1-2), 37-58.; Wu, Weiping; Zhou, Yu, 2012, The third mission


There are many difficulties that jeopardize the technological transfer in Romania, such as:

1) policy factors, such as the type of (technological) governmental support11, the fiscal incentives or the national and international legislation of intellectual property rights;

2) inadequate or weak intermediaries or Knowledge and Technology Transfer Organizations (KTTOs), such as university technology transfer offices, public research organizations, private knowledge and technology transfer organizations, for example business incubators or technological parks. The role of KTTOs is to recognize the potential value of knowledge-based opportunities, transform potential into actual value and transfer value to client organizations or companies12.

3) inadequate business models of private companies for the commercialization of new products and the use of new processes. Companies are usually unaware of the complexities of this process and the need to professionally manage it. Firms are frequently stuck in a status quo and hide behind the fear of upsetting the hierarchy and social systems that have contributed to past successes. This behaviour is considered oppressive for the process of knowledge transfer13. Also, the design of a firm will contribute to its performance through its configurations of positions, job duties, lines of authority, controls methods.

4) inadequate organizational culture and models of universities or research institutes. Too often, this generates only reactive approaches to their focal partners14 and produce late answers to the demands of the private sector. Some of the universities (especially in Romania) are captives in the paradigm of the universal research and knowledge, unsubordinated to private interests. This underestimates the end user’s needs and the context where the technology will be used, which is essential for the

stalled? Universities in China's technological progress, Journal of Technology Transfer, 37.6, 812-827.

11 Hartmann, G. B., & Masten, J., Profiles of state technological transfer structure and its impact on small manufacturers. The Journal of Technology Transfer, 25(1), 2000, p. 85.

12 Landry, R., Amara, N., &Doloreux, D., Knowledge-exchange strategies between KIBS firms and their clients. The Service Industries Journal, 32(2), 2012, p. 299

13 Lakpetch, P., &Lorsuwannarat, T., Knowledge transfer effectiveness of university-industry alliances. International Journal of Organizational Analysis, 20(2), 2012, p. 143

14 Rogers, E.M., The role of the research university in the spin-off of high technology companies, Technovation, Vol. 4, 1986, pp. 169-81


successful transfer of technology15. Also, the lack of a dedicated structure, the lack of an appropriate corporate culture, a strict set of rules and regulations, the merit process (rewards based only on published refereed articles and not the commercialization of products) or the bureaucratic structure are also internal factors that limit collaborations with the private organizations.

Organizational issues such as inflexible policies between partners16, certain staff characteristics, specifically the lack of the learning intent and absorptive capacity17, deficient managerial skills (they facilitate the management of the “causal ambiguity” and tacit knowledge in the innovation processes)18, the lack of partner and resources complementarities19 or the lack of socio-psychological aspects, such as trust, mutual commitment, bilateral information can also contribute to the ineffectiveness of the collaboration between research institutes and the private environment20.

Considering the situation, it would be vital for Romanian universities to ensure the role of facilitators of knowledge and technological transfer but unfortunately they lack the capacity to fulfil this social role.

But the blame should not be placed only on universities. Romanian SMEs are not used to the idea of innovation and are not aware of the

15 Johnson, S., Gatz, E., and Hicks, D., Expanding the content base of technology

education: technology transfer as a topic of study. Journal of Technology Education, 8 (2), 1997, p.42.

16 Park, B.I., Girond, A., Mirza, H., Whitelock, J., Knowledge acquisition and performance: the role of foreign partners in Korean International joint ventures, Asian Business Studies, Vol. 7 No. 11, 2008, p. 22.

17 Mowery, D.C., Oxley, J.E., & Silverman, B.S., Strategic alliances and interfirm knowledge transfer. Strategic management journal, 17(S2), p 88; Sarkar, M.B., Echambadi, R.A.J., & Harrison, J.S., 2001, Alliance entrepreneurship and firm market performance. Strategic management journal, 22(6-7), 1996, p. 709.

18 Day, G.S., The relational view: cooperative strategy and sources of inter- organizational competitive advantage, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 23 No. 4, 1995, pp. 669.

19 Glaister, K.W., Buckley, P., 1996, Understanding the antecedents of effective knowledge management: the importance of a knowledge-centered culture, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 33 No. 9, pp. 321; Mohr, J., & Spekman, R., 1994, Characteristics of partnership success: partnership attributes, communication behavior, and conflict resolution techniques. Strategic management journal, 15(2), p. 137; Hunt, S.D., & Morgan, R.M., 1995, The comparative advantage theory of competition. The Journal of Marketing, p. 12

20 Heide, J.B., & John, G., 1992, Do norms matter in marketing relationships?. The Journal of Marketing, p. 38; Hunt, S.D., & Morgan, R.M., 1995, The comparative advantage theory of competition. The Journal of Marketing, p. 13


multiple opportunities that technological transfer can bring to a company in today’s fierce competition. Even for innovative Romanian companies, there are barriers to innovation, the most important being the lack of qualified personnel, the adequate finance and the costs of meeting regulations.

Conclusions Public policies should be more focused on making it possible for

Romanian universities to play an active part in the process of knowledge and technological transfer. This requires the creation of a conceptual and practical model of technological transfer for Romanian universities and Romanian SMEs interested in technological transfer. It also requires:

encouraging Romanian universities to be more entrepreneurial and to connect better with the private business environment;

creating more flexible and evolutionary organizational models in Romanian universities, that include functional technology transfer offices;

more openness and awareness on behalf of Romanian SMEs on technological transfer.

In the long run, the organization and strengthening of a Romanian

model of technological transfer will produce the following economic welfare benefits:

at firm level: the gain of possible efficiency gains thanks to the function of university transfer offices, increasing awareness on external sources of innovation, increasing the R&D spending, better regulations;

at the society level: increasing the level of tacit knowledge and generating business model innovations;

at the level of public bodies involved in the regulation of the field and knowledge and technological transfer organizations: a better understanding of knowledge and technological transfer, that can be translated in better regulations or better specialized public services in the field.

REFERENCES

Ayres, R. U., (1988), Barriers and breakthroughs: an “expanding frontiers”

model of the technology-industry life cycle, Technovation, 7(2). Chen, J., & McQueen, R.J., (2010), Knowledge transfer processes for

different experience levels of knowledge recipients at an offshore technical support


center. Information Technology & People, 23(1). Choi, H.J., (2009), Technology transfer issues and a new technology

transfer model. Available at https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JOTS/v35/v35n1/choi.html Day, G.S., (1995), The relational view: cooperative strategy and sources of

inter- organizational competitive advantage, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 23 No. 4.

DeNisi, A.S., Von Glinow, M.A., Scandura, T.A., Colella, A.J., Johnson, D.M., Peach, E.B., ... & Pelc, K.I., (2000), Recruitment of High-Technology Workers: Today’s Real Challenges and Keys to Success.

Dyker, D.A., (1999), Foreign direct investment in the former Communist world: a key vehicle for technological upgrading?. Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, 12(3).

Frankema, E., &Lindblad, J.T., (2006), Technological development and economic growth in Indonesia and Thailand since 1950. ASEAN Economic Bulletin.

Giarini, O.; Maliţa, M., (2005), The Double Spiral of Education and Work (Dubla spirală a învățării și muncii), Bucharest, Comunicare.ro Publishing House.

Glaister, K.W., Buckley, P., (1996), Understanding the antecedents of effective knowledge management: the importance of a knowledge-centered culture, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 33 No. 9.

Hartmann, G.B., & Masten, J., (2000), Profiles of state technological transfer structure and its impact on small manufacturers. The Journal of Technology Transfer, 25(1).

Heide, J.B., & John, G., (1992), Do norms matter in marketing relationships?. The Journal of Marketing.

Hunt, S.D., & Morgan, R.M., (1995), The comparative advantage theory of competition. The Journal of Marketing, 1-15.

Ion, I., (2015), The Business Environment: Navigation guide. New Perspectives on analysing the external environment of companies (Lumea afacerilor: ghid de navigare. Noi perspective de analiza a mediului extern al firmei), Bucharest, ASE Publishing House

Johnson, S., Gatz, E., and Hicks, D., (1997), Expanding the content base of technology education: technology transfer as a topic of study. Journal of Technology Education, 8(2), 35-49.

Karkalakos, S., (2005), Regional technological differences: the case of southern European Union. The Journal of Technology Transfer, 30(3), 315-326.


Lakpetch, P., & Lorsuwannarat, T., (2012), Knowledge transfer effectiveness of university-industry alliances. International Journal of Organizational Analysis, 20(2), 128-186.

Landry, R., Amara, N., & Doloreux, D., (2012), Knowledge-exchange strategies between KIBS firms and their clients. The Service Industries Journal, 32(2), 291-320.

Mohr, J., & Spekman, R., (1994), Characteristics of partnership success: partnership attributes, communication behavior, and conflict resolution techniques. Strategic management journal, 15(2), 135-152.

Mowery, D.C., Oxley, J.E., & Silverman, B.S., (1996), Strategic alliances and interfirm knowledge transfer. Strategic management journal, 17(S2), 77-91.

Nicolae, M., (2013), Managing Organisational Innovation. The Road to Excellence (Managementul inovației organizaționale. Drumul spre excelență), Tritonic Publishing House.

Nicolae, M, (coord.), Moulder, J., Lixandru, I., (2010), Managing Creativity, Bucharest, ASE Publishing House.

Park, B.I., Girond, A., Mirza, H., Whitelock, J., (2008), Knowledge acquisition and performance: the role of foreign partners in Korean International joint ventures, Asian Business Studies, Vol. 7 No. 11.

Rogers, E.M., (1986), The role of the research university in the spin-off of high technology companies, Technovation, Vol. 4.

Sarkar, M.B., Echambadi, R.A. J., & Harrison, J.S., (2001), Alliance entrepreneurship and firm market performance. Strategic management journal, 22(6-7), 701-711.

Sexton, M.; Barrett, P., (2004), The role of technology transfer in innovation within small construction firms, Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, Vol. 11 Iss: 5.

Teasley, R., & Robinson, R., (2005), Understanding technology transfer effectiveness in Japanese organizations: A test of contingency theory. Academy of Strategic Management Journal, 4, 77.

Wu, Weiping; Zhou, Yu, (2012), The third mission stalled? Universities in China's technological progress, Journal of Technology Transfer, 37.6, 812-827.

Zucker, L.G., & Darby, M.R., (2001), Capturing technological opportunity via Japan's star scientists: Evidence from Japanese firms' biotech patents and products. The journal of Technology transfer, 26(1-2), 37-58.


PEDAGOGICAL ACTIVITY OF UNIVERSITY LECTURER IN THE CONDITIONS OF HUMANIZATION

ELENA MYSHAK

[email protected]

Abstract: The article deals with the problem of educational activities of

university lecturer in the terms of humanization of higher education. Humanistic orientation of university lecturer individual and the set of skills necessary for him to implement humanistic oriented activities in training have been defined. The attempt of analysis of the reasons impeding the realization of pedagogically appropriate humanistic principles in the correct selection of content, technologies, forms and methods of training has been made.

Keywords: humanization of education, evaluation of teacher activities,

humanistic values, professional knowledge, professional skills. Introduction It is focused on the implementation of the humanistic paradigm of

education in the main regulations of the "National Education Development Strategy in Ukraine for 2012-2021", the Law of Ukraine "On Higher Education", "Concept of Reform and Development of Agricultural Education and Science".

A characteristic feature of modern educational programs is focused on humanization of training, which aims to double process: the development of general and professional self-education of individual personality traits. Behind this it is a conscious desire for a new quality of training. Speaking of humanization of education teachers focus primarily on creating conditions for the development of student's personality and forget about the other equal subject of the educational process – a teacher and his development as a professional and a person.

At the same time according to I. Zyazyun humanization "can not be come to any particular technology or techniques, it is a holistic orientation, which is based on restructuring of teacher attitudes”1.

Lecturer at National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine. 1 Ziaziun, I., Dialogue of Cultures: Ukraine in a new context: the philosophy of education,

Lviv: World Publ, 1999, рр. 9-11.


We believe that the effectiveness of the process of humanization of education depends on the peculiarities of pedagogical activity of the teacher, which has a humanistic character by its nature.

The analysis of the scientific literature Numerous works of scientists are dedicated to the humanization of

education. Various aspects of the humanization of education, study of humanistic principles and methods of education are reflected in the works of I. Anosov, V. Astakhov, G. Ball, P. Belanov, V. Bondar, A. Vershinina, A. Vishnevskiy, K. Gavrilovets, S. Goncharenko, M. Dobruskin, V. Zinkevichus, I. Zyazyun, I. Kireeva, V. Kazakov, A. Listopad, L. Onischuk, M. Romanenko, A. Sushchenko, I. Timchuk, L. Tovazhnyansky, E. Shiyanov, V. Shubin.

Numerous recent publications are evidenced about the relevance of training teachers capable to carry out training of the future experts on humanistic principles. Aspects of the formation of a teacher personality, the technological issues of improving the training of specialists at agricultural universities are covered in the researches of I. Blozva, I. Bucyk, D. Gelyarovskaya, A. Demin, V. Ilyin, N. Zhuravskaya, T. Ischenko, A. Koloskov, P. Luzan, V. Manкo, A. Sushchenko. The development of а teacher as a person and a professional has been the subject of researchеs of E. Zeer, K. Levitan, I. Lushnikov, A. Markov, L. Mitin, V. Slastenin.

The purpose of the article is the study of pedagogical activity of a university lecturer in the context of humanization of education.

Aspects of humanistic oriented pedagogical activity of a university

lecturer We believe that the effectiveness of the humanization of higher

education is determined by the formation of a teacher as a person. We join A. Sushchenko’s opinion about the need for special attention to a teacher's personality, promotion process of self-actualization of his humanistic potential in pedagogical activity, objectification humanistic reserves as elements of the motivational sphere and the personality structure2.

Modern requirements for a teacher personality consist in the fact that "pedagogical worker should be a person with high moral qualities of

2 Suschenko, A., Theoretical and methodological foundations of educational humanization

of the teacher in the elementary school: Thesis. Thesis for obtaining sciences. Dr. degree. ped. sciences: 13.00.04 Theory and Methods of Professional Education, Kharkiv, 2004, p. 38.


character having the appropriate teacher training, an appropriate level of training, carrying out teaching activities, ensuring efficiency and quality of his work, physical and mental health, which enables to do professional duties in institutions"3.

In accordance with the theoretical research we identified a set of qualities required for teachers to implement the humanistic-oriented activities in training.

Professional knowledge: methodological − they include substantive concepts of humanism, humanity and humanization of education; socio-humanitarian and professional training; the main directions of humanistic orientation, as well as the general principles of psychological and educational events; theoretical − definition of humanistic orientation of social and humanitarian disciplines and special cycles; personality-oriented didactics; processes of humanization and humanization in vocational education, the goals and objectives of humanistic education; principles, forms and methods of humanistic education; methodical − peculiarities of socio-humanitarian and professional training at the university; technological − the means and methods of humanization of education.

Professional skills: gnostic − the ability to create a psychological climate of trust, forms of communication in the learning process, taking into account the individual characteristics of the person; the ability to formulate and argue correctly, defending his opinion; avoid authoritarianism and superiority; informational − the desire and the ability to adapt the educational information in accordance with the individual needs and abilities of students, be focused on their interests and needs; organizational − the ability to organize training and educational and extracurricular work with each student to strengthen his capacity; communicative − the ability to inspire confidence, to create a situation of success, compassion and community in solving problems; take into account the individual characteristics, the ability to have empathy; technological − the ability to attract students to the solution of problems in class using the principles of humanism, emotional and positive atmosphere in the learning process; applied − the ability to take into account and control the symptoms of their individual characteristics in the interaction4.

3 Volkova, N., Pedagogy: A Handbook for university students, Kyiv, Publishing House

Academy, 2002, p. 412. 4 Nerukh, N., Formation of humanistic orientation of future agronomists in the study of

humanities disciplines Thesis сandidate. ped. sciences: 13.00.04. Theory and Methods of Professional Education, Kyiv, 2009, p.60.


The role of a university lecturer in the formation of humanistic values of student's personality is manifested not only in the correct selection of content, technologies, forms and methods of teaching but also in a systematic purposeful work on himself, in the development and improvement of the moral qualities of self5.

Today it is irrational to approach to the educational process in high school the way used to be. Peremptory power of authoritarian pedagogy too shares a teacher and a student. It eclipses the equality of two parties (teacher − student), inhibits, does not enable young people to express themselves fully. It is necessary to give preference to a democratic pedagogy of cooperation, which aims to equal relations between students and teachers; it breaks the barrier between those who teach and those who are taught. This pedagogy of mutual trust and respect, cooperation and creativity.

Reasons constrained an active university lecturer participation in

solving the problems of humanistic orientation formation of future expert person.

Unfortunately, at the present stage observance pedagogically appropriate humanistic principles by university lecturers in the correct selection of content, technologies, forms and methods of training is almost realized. The vast majority of university lecturers incline to use traditional forms of learning guided by different reasons.

We believe that one of the dominant reasons of refraining an active university lecturer participation in solving problems of humanistic orientation formation of a future expert person is the problem of evaluation of pedagogical activity of lecturers at universities in Ukraine. Having studied the experience of the indicated work at the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine we came to the conclusion that there is an only one evaluation criterion of agricultural university lecturer activity among the possible evaluation criteria. It’s self-appraisal. Let's examine this aspect in detail.

Lecturer of agricultural university rating is determined by the results of his educational, methodical, scientific, educational activities and the introduction of scientific achievements into production. University

5 Myshak, E., Orientation of university lecturer individual in the context of education

humanization, Naykovuu visnyk NULES of Ukraine, Series: Pedagogy, Psychology, Philosophy, Kyiv, Vol. 199, 2014, p.230.


lecturer having a detailed methodology for the evaluation of his educational, scientific and methodological achievements for the year determines his rating.

The number of completed training hours effects on the results of his academic work essentially; the number of published workbooks and their scope (in printed pages) dominates in the evaluation of the results of methodical work; scientific achievements are mainly determined by the number of reports on the scientific and methodological conferences, articles and monographs. In summing up the educational work they take into account the number of conducted educational activities − interviews with students, excursions, parties, contests, etc.

Thus, in the rating estimation of educational activity of a lecturer of agricultural university emphases have been done on quantitative indicators of his work, and qualitative indicators of pedagogical activity are unheeded. It is about lecture skill of a teacher, his ability to implement modern teaching technology, teaching equipment, the importance of scientific achievements (developed scientific technology, methods, systems, and not the number of published scientific articles) and others6.

In this regard, to solve this problem we recommend to refer to the experience of the US higher education system, which has dominated approach in which the quality of teacher work is the determining criterion for evaluating his activities. It is based on a comprehensive study of the teacher activities in which following evaluation criteria are used: systematic formal rating at students; informal ranking at students; assessment of the head; ranking among colleagues; evaluation of teacher committee; content of course summaries, which is taught; teacher participation in the workshops; residual knowledge of students; exam results; popularity of elective courses (the number of students who attend); self-appraisal (the final report of a teacher).

It should be noted that the evaluation of pedagogical activity of university lecturer in the US is versatile, it involves colleagues, administration, students and public. It should be pointed out that the dominant characteristics in the evaluation of pedagogical skill of a teacher ares students’ opinion and the results of his academic work. In particular, after listening to the course the students are asked to evaluate its importance, usefulness, consistency of content and the like. In addition,

6 Voschevs’ka, O., Training agrarian engineers in higher education in the United States:

Thesis. candidate. ped. Sciences: 13.00.04, Ternopil’, 2008, p.57.


respondents evaluate pedagogical teacher technique, personality, attitude to students, identify his strengths and weaknesses.

It should be noted that the results of evaluation of university lecturers by students are available to the general public. In order to avoid mistakes in the correctness of their choice students get acquainted with the content and sequence of the course and results of questioning the teacher by their predecessors (primarily course is taught by several teachers). In turn, information about students' attitude to the proposed course and to a teacher is useful for him.

We believe that lit experience of evaluation of pedagogical activity of а university teacher in the US can be a valuable source of ideas for the formation of a personality of high school teacher able to carry out training students on humanistic principles.

Another important reason for inhibition of the humanistic orientation formation of the person of a future expert is one-sided understanding of the educational activities of university teachers7.

Unlike teachers of higher educational institutions of pedagogical profile, who have higher professional pedagogical education enriched with personal experience of teaching at school and experience of educational research at graduate teaching universities, many university lecturers of a different profile (technical, economic, medical, agricultural, etc.) don’t have professional psychological and pedagogical training and they are specialists in various subject fields, not focused on educational activities.

The specificity of higher agricultural education is that many university lecturers have vocational agricultural education, belong to the pedagogical activity as the production sector. Тhere are certain difficulties of the organization of the educational process in connection with such understanding of educational activities. Axiological potential of disciplines of general cultural education and social sciences is not being realized enough in practice of training. Most of university lecturers see their main task is to ensure mastering by students of engineering specialties required knowledge and skills. They consider the formation of humanistic values is the prerogative of family, church, community

7 Myshak, H., Pedagogical activity of teacher of higher agrarian educational establishments

in the conditions of humanization of education, Visnyk Dnipropetrovskoho universytetu imeni Alfreda Nobelia, Seriia: Pedahohika i psykholohiia, Dnipro, Vol. 2 (10), 2015, p.163.


organizations and relevant officials at the university (supervisors, associate dean for education, student activists and etc.).

Conclusions This study allows us to conclude that in the context of humanization

of education strategy of university lecturer activity has fundamentally different meaning − formation of a new type of multifaceted person in whole fullness of his intellectual, cultural, psychological and social development, which meets modern requirements. In this connection the problem of development of the university lecturer individual able to carry out training students in the context of humanization of education acquires special significance.

Unfortunately, proper work in this direction has not clear purposefulness and consistency or even absent at the universities. Traditional training system characterized the stability and conservatism is not conducive to the formation of the university lecturer personality able to carry out training future experts on humanistic principles.

Prospects for further research Priority area for further development of the described problem is to

study forms and methods of the university lecturer development as a professional and individual in the context of humanization of education, finding ways to optimize the process which has purpose to overcome the constant gap that exists between the scientific and theoretical knowledge and experience of university lecturers activities, create the conditions for interaction of pedagogy and practice.

REFERENCES Volkova, N., (2002), Pedagogy: A Handbook for university students, Kyiv,

Publishing House Academy. Voschevs’ka, O., (2008), Training agrarian engineers in higher education

in the United States: Thesis. candidate. ped. Sciences: 13.00.04, Ternopil’. Ziaziun, I., (1999), Dialogue of Cultures: Ukraine in a new context: the

philosophy of education, Lviv: World Publ. Myshak, H., (2014), Orientation of university lecturer individual in the

context of education humanization, Naykovuu visnyk NULES Of Ukraine, Series: Pedagogy, Psychology, Philosophy, Kyiv, Vol.199.

Myshak, H., (2015), Pedagogical activity of teacher of higher agrarian


educational establishments in the conditions of humanization of education, Visnyk Dnipropetrovskoho universytetu imeni Alfreda Nobelia, Seriia: Pedahohika i psykholohiia, Dnipro, Vol. 2 (10).

Nerukh, N., (2009), Formation of humanistic orientation of future agronomists in the study of humanities disciplines Thesis сandidate. ped. sciences: 13.00.04. Theory and Methods of Professional Education, Kyiv.

Suschenko, A., (2004), Theoretical and methodological foundations of educational humanization of the teacher in the elementary school: Thesis. Thesis for obtaining sciences. Dr. degree. ped. sciences: 13.00.04 Theory and Methods of Professional Education, Kharkiv.


IT APPROACH TO THE EVALUATION OF THE PROFESIONAL SKILLS OF UNIVERSITY GRADUATES

ALEXANDR КАNIVETS,

[email protected]

VLADISLAV NIZEGORODTCEV

[email protected]

Abstract: The employers’ requirements for university graduates’ skills are

considered in the article. Also the real market needs for lawyers, economists, financiers and philologists of foreign languages have been researched. For this purpose the authors have monitored the most advanced Ukrainian job-offer websites www.work.ua and www.rabota.ua. Attention is focused on the requirements of the modern employers’ who very often want their employees, except professional skills, to have knowledge and skills in IT and English.

The need to develop IT monitoring system to evaluate market needs for future specialists has been substantiated.

Keywords: informational technologies (IT), employers’ requirements,

market needs, university graduates. Introduction Due to the rapid changes in the sphere of higher education, the

problem of market needs for future specialists is a question of urgent importance. Modernization of the modern Ukrainian education put forward the new requirements to the training quality of university graduates.

Problems of implementation of the new IT competence approach to the evaluation of the market needs for university graduates is being actively discussed not only by scientists involved in the pedagogical problems, but also by representatives of companies, businesses and organizations who want to employ competent professionals.

Lecturer of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine.

Associate Professor of the University of State Tax Service of Ukraine.


The quantity of university graduates doesn’t always coincide with the employers’ expectations and the real market needs. Therefore the question of the evaluation of the market needs for future specialists is topical.

Attention should be paid to the fact that the informational technologies (IT) are becoming more popular in monitoring systems. The idea of implementation of IT into the pedagogy and namely into the monitoring system has arisen.

The analysis of the scientific literature The issue of correlation between the real market needs for specialists

and their quantity and quality of training has been researched by many domestic scholars such as P. Atamanchuk, V. Baydenk, G. Gryshchenko, I. Zymnia, V. Krajewski , V. Lugovoi, M. Martyniuk, John Raven, U. Frolov, V. Shadrykova, M. Shkil etc. The problems of development and implementation of the IT monitoring systems into the evaluation of the university training quality at the national and regional levels have been highlighted in the studies of the following famous Ukrainian researchers: V. Kremen, I. Vakarchuk, S. Nikolaenko, I. Davidovich, M. Pushkar, G. Shepitko and others. The information evaluation in education has been researched by T. Davydenko, G. Yelnykova, L. Kalinina and others.

The analysis of scientific literature showed that the issue of market needs for future specialists (philologists, economists and lawyers) hadn’t been investigated sufficiently in the pedagogical theory. Also the problem of implementation of the IT competence approach into the evaluation of the market needs for university graduates (lawyers, economists, financiers and philologists of foreign languages) had never been the subject of research.

Thus the purpose of the article is to investigate employers’ requirements as for employees’ skills; to evaluate the market needs for specialists (lawyers, economists, financiers and philologists of foreign languages) who recently graduated from the universities; and to substantiate the IT competency approach to the solving of this problem.

Presentation of the main material. The competence approach to the

evaluation of the market needs for specialists consists of many aspects. In our opinion it should involve, on the one hand, modern IT technics of monitoring such as continuous gathering information, its processing, analyses, assessments etc.; on the other hand it should consider the real


situation concerning the balance between specialists’ offer and demand at the Ukrainian labor market. By other words it is the balance between the university’s offer and employer’s demand.

Modern information society requires adoption of innovative solutions and new approaches to economic management, and modern economic development strategy of Ukraine have formed with the monitoring1.

According to our researches employers have used to pay attention to graduates who have well-formed personal qualities such as willingness to work and readiness to solve different problems, take active position in typical and unusual situations. As it turned to be employers evaluate not only professional knowledge and skills but especially a graduate’s ability to use his or her knowledge and skills. The scientists even have formulated the terms “ability to act”2.

Thus, the task of modern education shouldn’t be only directed to give strong knowledge and professional skills but also to help students to form highly oriented personal qualities, professional orientation etc. The task of modern education is to find relevance between the quality of training and the real needs of potential employers.

Employers emphasize that the development of professional skills of university graduates should be accompanied by the formation of skills to use information and communication technologies to solve applied issues3.

Today the development of IT is one of the main areas of scientific and technological progress. The range of applications of IT innovations includes biomedicine, food production, environmental protection, education, and other. Taking into consideration the advantages of IT in educational monitoring systems we are going to use the term ‘IT competence approach’ in our research.

Under the term ‘IT competence approach’ we understand, except computer monitoring, estimation from the market point of view, namely the real market needs for specialists that take into consideration the balance between job offers and job applications.

1 But V.A., State control and monitoring of the education quality at the higher school of

Ukraine. Materials of the Scientific Journal of the Academy of municipal administration. Volum 1. 2014, pp. 232-240.

2 Tarasova N.V., The strategy of the realization of the competence approach in education, Мoscow, Volume 1, 2007, p. 51.

3 Nizhehorodtsev V.O., Podenezhko O.V., The use of the applicant information analytical resources in the course of training of future specialists in economics. Materials of the Scientific Records Journal. Volum 141. Part ІІ. Kirovohrad, 2015, pp. 75-79.


There is a problem of conducting the computer monitoring that can help us to gather information about qualitative and quantitative characteristics of future professionals taking into consideration the requirements of employers and the needs of labor market4.

Having monitored the websites www.work.ua and www.rabota.ua and having investigated the employers’ requirements we have seen that the majority of employers want their potential staff:

1. To have high developed IT skills in informatics (sometimes even in programming), optimization and protection of information, ability to use different operating systems and applications, to do software design, development etc. Also employers want their potential staff to be flexible, dynamic and able to solve problematic situations and hard tasks.

2. To know foreign languages, mainly English and German.

So, there is the need to introduce the teaching and learning of IT at deeper level. But at the same time some scientists emphasize that despite the enormous increase of the use of information technologies in the educational spheres doesn’t always help to improve teaching and learning. The results can be directed against a student.

As the basis of the research we have taken two best Ukrainian universities: National University of Life end Environmental Sciences (NULES) and University of State Tax Service of Ukraine. Both of these universities train specialists in economics and law. The difference is the direction of training. NULES is aimed at training specialists for agriculture while University of State Tax Service of Ukraine specializes at customs services.

The interesting fact is the Pedagogical Faculty of NULES where philologists of foreign languages are trained. The idea was to train specialists in foreign languages for needs of agriculture but, as agriculture scopes limit the training, the studies are beyond any limitations. Taking into consideration the growing popularity of this profession we have decided to include this specialty into our research.

Before doing the research let us distinguished what employers require from university graduates at job-offer sites. In our opinion in majority of cases employers require:

1. High level of professional knowledge and skills plus knowledge and skills in IT and English;

4 Odynets V.A., Nizhehorodtsev V.O., Computer monitoring, analyses and modeling of

the national economy needs for the training of specialists by higher institutions of Ukraine, 2015, pp. 26-29.


2. The ability to implement the knowledge and skills into practice; 3. The experience of doing the real work. To determine the amount of necessary specialities that will be ordered

by universities they use different methods – from the simplest methods of comparison to the methods of expert assessment, the regulatory method, more complex computer models. For this purpose they often use econometric method according to which the need for future staff is derived from the anticipated final demand for employees per year5.

So, there is the need to create such the monitoring expert system for the labor market, which would allow predicting the required number of specialists bypassing their deficiency or excess. It’s well known that in market economies the demand for specialities and their amount is determined by the labor market. Analytical quantitative evaluation concerning training and finding jobs has allowed us to get monitoring information model of lawyers, economists, financiers and philologists.

The purpose of monitoring websites (www.work.ua and www.rabota.ua) was to get the information about current available vacancies and resumes and to compare results with the help of charts and diagrams.

As it turned to be the most popular specialties at the Ukrainian labor market are an accountant, financial analyst, financier, manager of credit, financial department manager, computer systems technician, system administrator, operator of the information systems, IT manager, content manager, supply manager, sales manager, office manager, manager on the work with clients, project manager, auditor, checker, economist, specialist on investments, specialist on monitoring, specialist on marketing, manager on advertising, sales analyst, manager on automating of business processes, risk manager, business analyst, economist of planning, translator (interpreter).

All abovementioned specialties may be roughly divided into four groups:

1. lawyers; 2. economists; 3. financiers; 4. philologists of foreign languages.

5 Balabanova L.V., The management of the staff, manual, Кyiv, 2006, p. 512.


We have decided to divide economists and financiers into different groups as economists deal with enterprises while financiers usually work for banks. We have investigated the newest information for March. The data are reflected in the Table 1 and Table 2.

Table 1. Data from the site www.rabota.ua

Specialty Vacancies, quantity

Resumes, quantity

Lawyers 699 3300 Economists 650 2713 Philologists of foreign languages

21 49

Financiers 346 528

Table 2. Data from the site www.work.ua


Resumes, quantity

Lawyers 483 5047 Economists 332 3839 Philologists of foreign languages 851 90 Financiers 139 557

Taking into consideration abovementioned figures we have made

two charts that visibly show the mutual relations between vacancies and resumes of five chosen professions.


0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

Lawyers Economists Philologists Financiers

699 650

21346

3300

2713

49

528

Vacancies,

quantity

Resumes,quantity

Chart 1. The data of vacancies and resumes from the website

www.rabota.ua

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

Lawyers Economists Philologists Financiers

483 332851

139

5047

3839

90557

Vacancies,

quantity

Resumes,

quantity

Chart 2. The data of vacancies and resumes from the website www.work.ua

As we can see most of resumes were submitted by lawyers

(www.rabota.ua – 3300; www.work.ua – 5047) and least of them – by


philologists of foreign languages (www.rabota.ua – 49; www.work.ua – 90). But if to take into consideration job offers and real employers’ needs for specialists, the picture will be as following: lawyers (www.rabota.ua – 699; www.work.ua – 483) and philologists of foreign languages (www.rabota.ua – 21; www.work.ua – 854).

We have calculated the arithmetical average of vacancies and resumes from both sites (www.work.ua and www.rabota.ua) for each specialty. The following table represents our calculations.

Table 3. The arithmetical average of vacancies and resumes from www.work.ua

and www.rabota.ua


Resumes, quantity

Lawyers 591 4173 Economists 491 3276 Philologists of foreign languages 436 69 Financiers 242 542

Taking into consideration the arithmetical average the correlation of

vacancies and resumes between the specialties will have the following percentage:

Chart 3. The correlation of vacancies among lawyers, economists, financiers and philologists of foreign languages


Chart 4. The correlation of resumes among lawyers, economists,

financiers and philologists of foreign languages Conclusions 1. According to our research in majority of cases employers, except

professional experience, want their employees to have knowledge and skills in IT and English.

2. The best method to evaluate the market needs for specialists is to use job-offer websites. The most advanced Ukrainian job-offer websites (www.work.ua and www.rabota.ua) have the function to register all resumes and vacancies for some period of time usually for the last month.

3. Monitoring has shown that lawyers dominate in quantity indicators (both vacancies and resumes) second and third positions are taken by economists and financiers. Philologists of foreign languages have occupied the last position but at March 2017 the amount of vacancies have exceeded the amount of resumes. It tells about growing needs in interpreters and translators.

Concerning future perspectives we are sure that IT monitoring

activities directed at making the predictive valuation of the needs of the labor market may help educational institutions to assess the situation and to make the right decision on choosing those professions that are in demand.


REFERENCES Balabanova L.V., (2006), The management of the staff, manual, Кyiv. But V.A. (2014) State control and monitoring of the education quality at the

higher school of Ukraine. Materials of the Scientific Journal of the Academy of municipal administration. Volum 1.

Nizhehorodtsev V.O., Podenezhko O.V., (2015), The use of the applicant information analytical resources in the course of training of future specialists in economics. Materials of the Scientific Records Journal. Volum 141. Part ІІ. Kirovohrad.

Odynets V.A., Nizhehorodtsev V.O., (2015), Computer monitoring, analyses and modeling of the national economy needs for the training of specialists by higher institutions of Ukraine.

Tarasova N.V., (2007), The strategy of the realization of the competence approach in education, Мoscow, Volume 1.


THE SIGNIFICANCE OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE IN TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP FOR PUBLIC

UNIVERSITIES

DUMITRU VALERIU

[email protected]

Abstract: The trend today in Universities is emphasizing reputation and key performance indicators including ranking of universities as the population at large, goes for education in this technology driven orientation. New trends of education are directing towards this change and Rectors and Pro-Rectors of the universities strive hard to realize such aspirations. To fulfill such purposes universities need to transform and issues involving transformation and shift sphere around leadership. This paper analyzed the significance of emotional intelligence on transformational leadership in public universities. A survey was carried out in four public universities using a questionnaire. Stratified random sampling was used to collect data from all cadres of staff obtained both quantitative and qualitative data. The results showed that emotional intelligence is significant in transformational leadership.

Keywords: Self-awareness, social awareness, social management,

relationship management, Idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individual consideration.

Introduction Higher education institutions, the world over, are facing new

challenges which require reforms in their management and governance styles. The rise of new stakeholders, internal factors, together with globalization and the rapid pace at which new knowledge is created and utilized, growth in student enrolments and in the number of higher education institutions are among the recent developments which challenge higher education institutions. The rapid expansion of university education has led to a number of challenges. According to UNESCO

Prof. PhD., The University of Piteşti, The Facultaty of Educational Sciences,

Social and Psychological Sciences.


World Conference on higher education (1998)1, low funding from the exchequer, increased enrolment, increased enrolment without commensurate improvement in available facilities, and a low research capacity, are some of the problems facing universities.

The institutions of higher learning have, therefore, been forced to rethink their strategy and possibly look for extra sources of financing including establishing income-generating activities. They are caught between fix severe budget cuts and a flood of students in search of useful degrees resulting in overcrowding, low budgets and staff retention problems. The change in funding requires employees to be fully engaged so that the organization can obtain its monies worth. Further public universities face competition as they seek to offer university education to the public. The private sector is also competing for the same students and employees. It is, therefore, necessary to have a competitive strategy which is cost effective to enhance performance bearing in mind the budget constraints.

Governance is important too because it involves the recruitment of the individuals managing the higher education institutions and determines relevance and whether management structures are more or less open. Steps have already been taken to enhance the democratization of decision-making within the universities by promoting wider representation of staff and students in key university governing bodies and allowing staff a greater say in selecting senior university administrators.

Any reform package requires a determined leader whose vision and support make possible the success of reform strategies. One variable that has recently gained much popularity as a potential underlying attribute of effective leadership is the construct of emotional intelligence (EI) Sosik and Mererian2. EI is described as a set of abilities that refer in part to how effectively one deals with emotions both within oneself and others. It has been proposed that in leadership, dealing effectively with emotions may contribute to how one handles the needs of individuals, how one effectively motivates employees, and makes them feel at work3. Today’s

1 UNESCO, Higher education in twenty first century vision and action. Paris:5-9th October, 1998, 211-216.

2 Sosisk, J., & Megerian, J., Understanding leader emotional intelligence and performance. Group and organization Management, Vol. 24, 1999, pp.367-9.

3 Goleman, D., Working with Emotional Intelligence, London, Bloomsbury Publishing, 1998, 211-219.


effective leadership skills have been described to depend, in part on the understanding of emotions and the abilities associated with EI.

Transformational leadership has been found to be consistently related to organizational and leadership effectiveness. Transformational leaders believe in the need for change. They, then articulate a vision of the future of the organization, and provide a model that is consistent with the vision. They then foster the acceptance of group goals and provide individualized support afterwards. As a result, followers of transformational leaders often feel trust and respect towards the leader and are motivated to do more than they are expected to do. Therefore, leaders change the beliefs and attitudes of their followers so that they are willing to perform beyond the minimum levels specified by the organization.

1.1. Problem statement The dawning of the age of accountability brought by reform

movements beginning in the 1980s, needed reforms in the educational sector and universities were not exempt. Today universities over the world attempt to advance themselves in academic programs, research and innovation, towards academic excellence in the wake of the competitive era, toward worldwide universities. Therefore, the trend today is emphasizing reputation and key performance indicators including ranking of universities as the population at large, goes for education in this technology driven orientation. New trends of education are directing towards this change and the management of the universities strive hard to realize such aspirations. Therefore universities are aspiring to be recognized for their prestige in programs, research, publications, faculties, students, innovations, collaborations, industry linkages and entrepreneurships through certifications like ISO and other relevant recognitions. To fulfill such purposes universities need to transform and issues involving transformation and shift sphere around leadership. Leadership is a critical factor in Universities to steer the direction and implementation of processes towards reforms4.

Burns 1978 as cited by Reed (2005) introduced the concept of transformation leadership describing it as not a set of specific behaviors but rather a process by which leaders and followers encourage one

4 Dumitru, Andrei, Physical Therapy Pediatrics version. Theoretical and applied SITECH

Publishing, Craiova, 2016, 120-122.


another to higher levels of morality and motivation. There must be a connection made between individuals and groups and how emotional intelligence improves the workplace, which translates into improved performance and organization’s ability to acquire, develop, and retain human capital in order for it to be meaningful in the

University setting. Exactly how, and to what extent EI accounts for effective transformational leadership is currently unknown. Despite much interest in relating EI to effective TL there is little research published that has explicitly examined this relationship. This study sought to address this. The research was guided by two objectives

a) To establish the relationship between emotional intelligence and transformational leadership. b) To examine how emotional intelligence impacts transformational leadership. The two research questions were 1) is there a relationship between emotional intelligence and transformational leadership and 2) Does emotional intelligence impact transformational leadership?

Transformational Leadership Literature review A review of leadership literature reveals an array of definitions

concerning its nature and application. Burns J. M. as cited by Reeds suggested that leadership is one of the most often observed and least understood phenomenon on earth. Beyond defining leadership, studies consistently center on the question: What makes a leader effective or ineffective? Yukl5 asserted leadership effectiveness is not conveniently quantified by organizational outcomes and results. Many definitions have been given on leadership but according to many definitions, leadership has been conceived as the focus of group process, as a matter of personality, as a matter of inducing compliance, as the exercise of influence, as particular behaviors, as a form of persuasion, as a power relation, as an instrument to achieve goals, as an effect of interaction, as a differentiated role, as an initiation of structure, and as many combinations of this definition. In the past leadership studies focused on trait and situational approaches.

Current developments in leadership have focused on transformational and transactional approaches. It was defined TL as leadership that occurs when the leader stimulates the interest among

5 Yukl, G., Leadership in organizations. Saddle River, NJ. Prentice Hall Inc, 1992, 327 –

332.


colleagues and followers to view their work from a new perspective. The TL generates an awareness of the mission or vision of the organization, and develops colleagues and followers to higher levels of ability and potential. Top performing managers are seen as more TL in their leadership style than ordinary managers. There were no gender differences for TL scores of male and female managers. In the past leadership studies focused on trait and situational approaches. It was stated that concept of transformational leadership is a change orientated framework comprised of a list of behaviors that contribute to change.

Dimensions/ elements of TL: Reeds point out that TL comprises of

four dimensions the “Four Is” Idealized influence, Inspirational motivation, Intellectual stimulation and Individualized consideration which may be defined as follows: a) Individualized influence: This dimension is as a result of trust and respect of followers to the leader for doing right. This done through stories and symbols to communication the vision and mission and serving as role models. The TL operate out of a deeply held personal value system that includes qualities like justice and integrity which in turn unite their followers changing their goals and beliefs for the better. b) Intellectual stimulation. This element promotes intelligence, rationality, and careful problem solving abilities as TL make employees seeks their own answers.

1. Individual consideration: The TL leaders treat employees as individuals and not just members of a group. This is done through compassion, appreciation and responsiveness to employee needs alongside recognition and celebration of achievements.

2. Inspirational motivation: TL inspire their followers to achieve greatly through high expectations. They have power and influence giving employees a high degree of trust and confidence in them.

Influence of Transformational Leaders on followers. TL boosts

intrinsic motivation and provides intellectual stimulation thus encouraging followers to challenge the status quo and the old ways of doing things. TL is said to be multifaceted, complex and dynamic in that leaders can affect followers by highlighting different aspects of their follower’s social self concept and change their focus from one level to another.

Through individualized consideration, a leader addresses issues of competence, meaningfulness and impact with each team members and encourages


continued individual development. Intellectual stimulation increases the followers feeling of self worthiness. TL influences followers to transcend self interests for the sake of the welfare of the organization. TL affects development as well as performance6.

TL exert additional influence by broadening and elevating their follower’s goals Thus they exhibit Idealized Influence, Inspirational motivation, Intellectual stimulation and Individualized consideration which in turn arouse admiration, inspire motivate, provide intellectual stimulation and treatment of their followers with idealized consideration. The followers in turn reach full potential generating enhanced performance. TL is also seen as enabling as their leader follower relationships are transformed into one where both players are partners. The universities going through transformation then, require transformational type of leadership.

Emotional Intelligence Peter Salovey and John Mayer (1990) carried out research based on

these earlier works in order to establish Emotional intelligence and a genuine intelligence based on the concept and definition of intelligence. According to them intellect and emotional intelligence are two different constructs and they use different parts of the brain. Therefore as a term, emotional intelligence first made its first appearance in 1989 in an article by two American academic psychologist, John D. Mayer and Peter Salovey7. They defined emotional intelligence as “the ability to monitor one’s own and others’ feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions.’ They came up with an ability model with four separate elements of Emotional intelligence namely identifying emotions, using emotions, understanding emotions and managing emotions.

Daniel Goleman (1995)8 developed further the work of Mayer, and Salovey and in association with the Hay Group developed the following models of competencies. Personal competences which determine how we

6 Modassir A., Sing T., Relationship of emotional intelligence with transformational

leadership and organizational citizenship behavior. International Journal of Leadership Studies, Vol.4 1, pp. 3-21 School of Global Leadership & Entrepreneurship, Regent University, 2008.

7 Salovey, P. & Mayer, J., “Emotional intelligence”, Imagination, Cognition and Personality, Vol. 9, 1990, 83-88.

8 Daniel Goleman (1995) Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam, 193-197.


manage we manage ourselves including self-awareness, emotional self-awareness, accurate self-assessment, self-management, self-control, trustworthiness, conscientiousness, adaptability, achievement orientation and initiative.

Social competencies are the competences that determine how we handle relationships including social awareness, empathy, organizational awareness, self orientation, social skills, developing others, leadership, communication, change catalyst, conflict management, building bonds and teamwork and collaboration. He argues further that the traits are human qualities that every person has access to and it is merely a case of developing these skills to increase emotional intelligence. He came up with one hundred and thirty seven item Emotional Quotient to measure the five dimensions of Emotional intelligence. IQ by itself is not a very good predictor of job performance. Hunter and Hunter (1984) estimated that t best IQ accounts for about 25% of the variance. Sternberg (1996) has pointed out that studies vary and that 10% may be a more realistic estimate. Bar-On (1997)9 also developed an EI model using fifteen conceptual constructs in the operationalization of the model. He developed one hundred and thirty three item questionnaires with a rating of five points.

Importance of emotional intelligence In a world of work where people are increasingly accepted to be the

competitive edge, any theory that seems to offer the possibility of enabling them to work together more co-operatively and productively is likely to raise a great deal of interest. Such was the case when the concept of emotional intelligence first came to public. Higgs and Dulewicz (1999)10 identified seven elements of emotional intelligence broken down into three areas. Drivers, which include motivation and decisiveness, traits that energize people and drive them towards achieving goals. Constrainers: Conscientiousness, integrity and emotional resilience, factors that control and curb the excesses of the drivers. Enablers: Sensitivity, influence and self-awareness, traits that facilitate performance and help individuals to succeed.

9 Bar-On, R., Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory Technical Manual. New York Multi-

Health Systems, 1997, 240-245. 10 Higgs, M. & Dulewicz, V., Making Sense of Emotional Intelligence. Windsor: NFER-

Nelson, 1999, 231-237.


Goleman (1999) on emotional intelligence in the workplace argues that emotionally intelligent managers are better able to resolve workplace conflict and are better negotiators and leaders. Emotional intelligence is also an effective way of identifying leadership potential because the qualities that constitute good leadership such as decisiveness, empowering others and openness to change all reflect aspects of emotional intelligence. Therefore there are aspects of management, leadership and teamwork in which competencies owing their origin to emotional states are at least as important as technical abilities. Managing personal emotions and adapting them to circumstances and understanding others’ emotions, is an important aspect of leadership and teamwork. Emotional intelligence has become a vital part of how today’s leaders meet the significant challenges they face. Emotional intelligence can help leaders in an ever more difficult leadership role. In the middle of the “Talent War”, especially at the highest level in organizations, emotional intelligence can give developing leaders a competitive edge. A certain level of emotional intelligence is necessary to learn the emotional competencies. Emotional competencies are linked to and based on emotional intelligence.

Methods The research design was quantitative and the designs, techniques and

measures produced discreet numerical or quantifiable data. The target population was the seven public universities namely: University of Pitesti, University of Bucharest, University “Politechnica” Bucharest, Academy of Economic Studies Bucharest, National Academy of Physical Education and Sports Bucharest, University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest, University “Valachia” Targoviste, Petroleum and Gas University Ploiesti.

The study included all staff cadres in the seven public universities which formed four strata: Management, teaching, middle level and junior level staff.

Data Collection Methods The main research tool was a structured questionnaire, which was

preferred as it would provide a relatively simple and straightforward approach to the study. The questionnaire was constructed using Genos Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Short Version for workplace applications) for the four domains and the elements of TL. Likert scale


questions were used to obtain quantitative data and semi-structured questions used for qualitative data. The research instrument was pre-tested using a sample of 1.5% as a successful pilot study would use 1% to 10% of the actual sample size. The respondents used for pretesting were similar to the sample under study using procedures similar to those of the actual study. The data had a minimum target sample of 384. The sampling frame consisting of about 10% of the total population had a response rate of 548 questionnaires which accounts for 55% response rate.

Data Analysis and Findings The data was both qualitative and quantitative. The Statistical

Package for Social Science (SPSS) was used in the analysis to execute quantitative data.

Descriptive statistics such as percentages were used to analyze the qualitative data. The findings suggest that the four elements of transformational leadership correlated with the four domains of emotional intelligence.

1.2. Research Objectives The overall objective of the study is to examine how emotional

intelligence, and transformational leadership may be used to enhance employee engagement in public universities.

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The self awareness domain had emotional self-awareness (.163) and accurate self assessment (.121) significantly related to trust and respect for leadership. Also for self management, self control (.101), trustworthiness & conscientiousness (.097) and initiative (.115) were related to trust and respect. The social awareness domain had empathy and service orientation (.95) connected to trust and respect while relationship management connected developing others (.153) and influence and change catalyst (.132).

Employees being treated as individuals was related to social awareness domain in organizational awareness (.169), developing others (.117) for relationship management and influence and change catalyst (.098). Employees being encouraged to achieve the university mission had the most significant link as it was related to accurate self assessment (.115), self confidence (.111), almost all the self management domain namely self control (.097), trustworthiness & conscientiousness (.132), optimism (.146), initiative ) .145) and achievement drive (.098). It was also connected to the social awareness domain on empathy and service orientation (.149) and organizational awareness (.104). The relationship management domain had developing others (.146), influence and change catalyst and teamwork and collaboration.

Celebrating individual and team accomplishments was linked to self awareness domain on emotional self awareness (.097), accurate self assessment (.107), and self management domain and the self management domain had self control (.094), social awareness linked organizational awareness (.129) and the relationship management had influence and change catalyst (.149) and communication and conflict management (.129).

Openness to change and new ideas was connected to emotional self awareness (.096), organizational awareness (.237), developing others (.109) and communication and conflict management (.104).

Anticipating and meeting customer needs was connected to emotional self awareness (.173), accurate self assessment (.106), self control (.178), trustworthiness and conscientiousness (.133), empathy and service orientation (.113), organizational awareness (.099), developing others (.183), leadership and building bonds (.141), influence and change catalyst (.197), communication and conflict management (.099) and teamwork and collaboration (.123). Employees encouragement to get involved in goal setting was significant to emotional self awareness (.125), organizational awareness (.145), leadership and building bonds (.110),


influence and change catalyst (.159) and communication and conflict management (.113).Development of employee skills, knowledge and abilities was connected to emotional self awareness (.102), organizational awareness (.229), developing others (.122) and influence and change catalyst (.111).

The factor analysis for transformational leadership resulted in one component. Therefore there was no iteration because only one component was extracted.

12: Transformational leadership factor analysis

Table 7. EI factor analysis Component

1

3 2

Teamwork and Collaboration .702

.296 .030 Trustworthiness & Conscientiousness .676 .323 .001Optimism .667 .293 .020Initiative .625 .306 .191Leadership & Building Bonds .597 .022 .475Empathy & Social Orientation .496 .164 .425Accurate self assessment -.007 .712 .223Emotional self awareness .161 .669 .133

Component Matrixa Component

Openness to change and new ideas .804Individual treatment and valuing of views .769Employees involvement in goal setting .766Development of employee skills .751Celebration of accomplishments .751Anticipating and meeting customer needs .696Employees encouraged on university mission .632Trust and respect for leadership .631


Self confidence .401

.042 .614 Self control .169 .538 .221Adaptability .307 .498 .210Achievement drive .364 .422 .238Organizational awareness -.053 .167 .725Communication & conflict management .131 .243 .645Influence and change catalyst .277 .174 .597Developing others .306 .193 .592

Rotated Component Matrixa A factor analysis of transformational leadership extracted one factor

with loadings from .804 for openness to change and new ideas and .631 for trust and leadership being the lowest. Individual treatment and valuing of views, employees involvement in goal setting, development of skills, celebration of accomplishments range between .769 and .751 indicating closeness in similarity where loading is concerned.

Anticipating and meeting customer needs, employees being encouraged to achieve university mission and trust and respect for leadership loadings are from .696 to .631. The factor analysis results indicate that all the elements of transformational leadership were perceived to be highly significant by university employees.

Factor analysis was done to examine emotional intelligence. Normally for less than 30 variables with more than 250 cases, then variables explaining above 60% of the variability are retained and the others discarded. The extraction method used was Principal Component Analysis and the Rotation Method employed was Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. The rotation converged in five iterations for EI with 9 variables remaining out of 16. Goleman (1998) conceptualized emotional intelligence as a four factor structure with components as Self awareness, self management, social awareness and relationship management. According to this four factor model the emotional intelligence competences should cluster into to four domains. However factor analysis of emotional intelligence in this study resulted in three components with loadings between .712 and .614. This shows that the emotional competencies that are highly significant in this study are: teamwork and collaboration, trustworthiness and conscientiousness, optimism, initiative, emotional self awareness, self confidence, organizational awareness,


accurate self assessment, and communication & conflict management. There is a clear establishment of correlation between emotional

intelligence and transformational leadership. Specifically, most of the emotional intelligence competencies were significantly correlated to the transformational leadership. The self awareness competency correlated with transformational leadership except in the statement that employees are treated as individuals and their views and ideas are sought and contributions valued of idealized influence. It is worth noting that employees’ encouragement to achieve the university mission correlated with all the attributes of self management. The social awareness competencies significantly correlated with transformational leadership at both 0.01 and 0.05 level of significance. The five competencies of relationship management also correlated significantly.

Discussion The universities clearly established a relationship exist between

emotional intelligence and transformational leadership. The findings are in agreement with various research studies carried out in the past. Studies conducted found that EI is associated with TL in three aspects idealized influence, inspirational motivation and individualized consideration. Analysis base on the studies showed that the followers perceived leaders with high EI as more effective and transformational. They found that EI conceptually and empirically related to TL behaviors. Hence they concluded that having high EI increased one’s TL behaviors.

It was found that leaders with a high EI component of understanding emotions were able to perceive accurately the extent to which followers’ expectations can be raised. This related the TL’s subcomponent of inspirational motivation. They also found that a major component individualized consideration is the capacity to understand followers’ needs and interact accordingly. With emphasis on empathy and the ability to manage relationships positively, leaders having EI are likely to manifest individualized consideration. It was noticed that the inspirational motivation and individualized consideration components of TL are significantly correlated with the ability to both monitor and manage emotions in oneself and others.

The researches done on the relationship of emotional competencies to transformational leadership on education leaders clearly indicated that emotional competencies are related to transformational leadership. Further studies on emotional intelligence and leadership effectiveness


showed EI as a strong predictor of leadership effectiveness. Researches carried out on EI correlated with several components of TL are suggesting it may be an important component of effective leadership. Research on the relationship between EI with TL and Organizational citizenship behavior involving 57 leaders and 114 respondents found that EI of leaders enhances OCB of followers. Research carried out on considerations in dealing with change decision management shows that EI may be a predictor of success, in cognitive based performance. Thus one can conclude that transformational leadership and emotional intelligence are positively related and that they affect the performance of leaders.

Conclusions and recommendations It was also established that there is a relationship between emotional

intelligence and transformational leadership. The relationship between EI and TL is most significant where organizational awareness is concerned which involves understanding emotional currents and power relationships in the university which linked all elements of TL except for trust and respect for leadership. Also influence and change catalyst is linked to all except for openness to change and new ideas.

This is followed by developing others thought does not connect with celebration of individual and team accomplishments and employees encouragement to get involved in goal setting. Emotional self awareness which involves recognition of self emotional and their effect on self and others is linked to the TL elements except for employees being treated as individuals and their views and ideas sought and contributions valued. It is also not linked to employees being encouraged to achieve the university mission. It is worth noting that at least each elements of TL showed a relationship with at least one competence of EI except for adaptability which requires working with ease within a variety of change situations and this is an individual alone display of competence.

REFERENCES

Bar-On, R., (1997), Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory Technical

Manual. New York Multi-Health Systems. Goleman, Daniel, (1995), Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam. Dumitru, Andrei, (2016), Physical Therapy Pediatrics Version. Theoretical

and applied SITECH Publishing, Craiova.


Goleman, D., (1998), Working with Emotional Intelligence, London, Bloomsbury Publishing.

Higgs, M. & Dulewicz, V., (1999), Making Sense of Emotional Intelligence. Windsor: NFER-Nelson.

Modassir A., Sing T., (2008), Relationship of emotional intelligence with transformational leadership and organizational citizenship behavior. International Journal of Leadership Studies, Vol.4 1, School of Global Leadership & Entrepreneurship, Regent University.

Salovey, P. & Mayer, J., (1990), “Emotional intelligence”, Imagination, Cognition and Personality, Vol. 9.

Sosisk, J., & Megerian, J., (1999), Understanding leader emotional intelligence and performance. Group and organization Management, Vol.24.

UNESCO, (1998), Higher education in twenty first century vision and action. Paris: 5-9th October.

Yukl, G., (1992), Leadership in organizations. Saddle River, NJ. Prentice Hall Inc.


THE MENTAL TABLEAU

ZENO GOZO

[email protected]

Abstract: As we very well know, the mental tableau is formed and formated during childhood, puberty and adolescence and aims towards completeness in adulthood. But why do we need to come up with concepts that combine a psychological and/ or philosophical element –mental and/ or intellectual – with another concept like “picture” or “landscape” that par excellence belongs to the fine arts? Aren’t the fields in discussion too disparate to even find some possible linking bridges between them? Moreover, these bridges that we would find, could they be fertile from the point of view of enlightenment of the spiny and the very old discussion about the human mind and its modality to operate? Or maybe, precisely this lying in wait in the somehow closed territory of a domain could be the shortcoming that narrows (more and more overtime) the possibility of its exploration, uninhibited by prejudice, in such a way that, at a certain moment, it starts to lose the fertile field of its maximum ideaistic opening in the fresh and uninhibited approach of the subject. That is just why I think that by linking some perspectives coming from different fields – the life concepts of the mental opposite to the evolution of fine arts – that can, however, be brought together towards a common denominator of a fertilizing dialogue, we have created the premises of an interesting discussion in the unconventional of an approach that allows itself to come up with unexpected but clarifying points of view regarding a problematic that is still concerning, even in an era where neurosciences have made remarkable progress in clarifying the mechanisms of the human mind1.

Senior Lecturer PhD., Faculty of Psychology, Universitaty “Tibiscus” of

Timişoara, Timişoara. 1 As a first class neurologist, Antonio Damasio states, referring to the interference of

the emotional into the intelectual: „I began writing this book to show that the reason could be not as pure as we thought, or as we wanted, that the emotions and feelings could not be exactly intruders in the stronghold of reason; they could actually be caught in the web of reason, for good and for worse” (Damasio, 2004, p. 8). What strikes in this quote of the high class neurologist is the insistent presence of the conditional mood that automatically sends to undiscovered mysteries of the functioning of the human mind functioning. In other words, we could expect yet more and perhaps revolutionary discoveries of the intimate mechanisms of our brain and its multi-level operating modalities.


Keywords: mental tableau, adult, mature-growing up, projection, history of painting, individualization.

Circumscription/delimitation of ideas In the following, we will take into account some reference points of

our psycho-physical development of our ontogenetic evolution: child, pubescent/adolescent, adult. Widely accepted and already self-evident, these reference points could not represent a too serious of a support for a new discussion regarding the human mental, but only if we add the concept of mature2. Although the dictionaries are overlapping, at least partially, the concept of “adult” and “mature”, there is still a small difference of nuance, a difference as more obvious as when referring to the term “mature” we talk about maturing, meaning a progressive process, while by the term of “adult”, we only understand a reached phase (or reachable in the case of childhood or adolescence) that does not imply any “adultization”, so to speak. It is precisely on this small difference of nuance we will focus on in this article, relying abundantly and copiously on a large parallel with the history of fine arts (in this case, of painting) that will help us illustrate and even describe what we understand by “mental tableau”. We call upon this “plastic infusion” because visual arts have had, starting with the second half of the 19th century, an evolution that was at least thrilling, and truly dramatic here and there, crammed with many convulsions that were accompanying and opposing, illustrating and highlighting the spiritual evolution of Occiedntal humanity. As the history of philosophy very well notices, systems have always been built on the preceding ones, after they have eliminated, swallowed or digested the ancestors’ lesson, as well in the history of painting, at least from Renaissance forward, we can speak of an ongoing effort of reevaluation, rethinking and rewriting or more precisely redrawing of the ancestors’ decided lessons, that became, with the passing of time, “classical” in an approach that cannot bypass the irresistible attraction of the absolute, evidently manifested in the ceaseless auto-transcendence of any class creation.

The mental tableau is created, for the most part, from conglomerations of different traditional fixations, coupled with the strong

2 The difference between adult and mature is largely discussed in An Insight into

Adult Education (O incursiune în educaţia adulţilor), pages 7-21.


stereotypical mindsets, agglutinated in the collective mental and from personalized orientations (that mostly appear through small slips illustrated by the theory of chaos where each result, slightly different from the precedent, re-enters the system, modifying it) respectively the particular reorientations accomplished by every individual during his life. The tableau picture is a space or, more precisely, a projective horizon of the cultural-intellectual traditionalist coverage (no matter what its expanse and/or depth may be) of an individual. It is manifested as a projection of the mind in which the individual sees himself engaged and absorbed without taking anymore into account what is happening in the ”projection room”, respectively in the reality (real, and not mental) in which his body is situated. Because the body, situated in time and space can be extremely easily left aside, forgotten in its ordinary physical reality, detrimental to the locking of the psychic through the connection to the projection given by some mental fantasy. It seems that lately, the projective sources of the mental picture are exponentially facilitated, enlarged and enriched by the internet (a globalized, in its turn, projection of the world on a small screen, at hand to every citizen of the globe). In this union, the collective fraction keeps to little account of the individual option, the first manifests itself rather by the general trend that absorbs, comprises or even swallows, under the turmoil of the universal gregariousness, more and more individuals that browse under the impression of complete liberty and total independence. It looks like the tableau is largely populated and animated by items of the universe of “to have” (as Erich Fromm (Fromm, 1976) understood), of possessions that very easily conquer our expandable horizon, in this way indefinitely3. As our horizon populates itself, throughout childhood and youth with the items of – let us say of “to have” domain – it also searches to complete itself or to fulfil, so that for other values like the values of “to be” or “to become”, there is not much room left, maybe only, at most, in the abstruse

3 Endless, yes, but no way infinite; there are possible repetitions, permutations,

combinations, small alternatives or modifications on the same subject that still remains constant in its invariance; the variations on different topics (in fact, of more or less collective nature) that seem to deviate in different directions, define the larger spectrum of choices that seem to be of individual nature. Sadly, these strays from the norm are nothing but small idiosyncrasies, ripples on the surface of the same collective ocean that seem to be gaining, as more as they are brought up by their own infatuation, an apparent personal character.


periphery of the subliminal4. The issue with the internet is sort of the same: if the mind engages in the virtual projections, not much room remains for the immediate surrounding reality because, just like it can happen to you anytime, the neighbour can ask, early in the morning, on a perfect sunny summer day: “What is the internet saying about the weather today?”. Actually, each and everyone, the one with a cable connection or the shopaholic embedded in the universe of “to have”, have mental horizons populated practically ad nauseam with contents, aspects, things to see, to want, to have or to know that, all put together, will form a complete tableau in which the individual is immersed and embedded; the emerging attachments and addictions are to be untimely interconnected, compared to and/or corroborated, in the spirit of inherent gregariousness, with the tableau of all, the real or virtual friends (as the case may be). As a consequence the relation of the individual with the surrounding reality, the relation of the individual with others or even with his own self become partial, skimmed through, inauthentic and by excellence superficial, permanently coloured by the discharge of ideas and novelties that ceaselessly appear from the mental tableau.

A major component of the mental tableau (inexhaustible source of always renewable items, at least at a superficial level of analysis) is given by the televised mass-media that can drive and absorb the contemporary human being almost completely in the unending but nevertheless same net of the new that invades and corrodes the personal life, every hour, every day. A sub-domain of the media area is the sports news, meaning, more or less, football that can manipulate the mind of the individuals excessively with celebrity names, memorable games, incredible scores, unforgettable championships and also referees that, as everyone knows, are always to blame… All of these and others alike create actual universes in which the mental of the individual and not only is incorporated and embedded. The situation is same with alcohol, respectively “the drinking”, as it is with all the other addictions: drugs and or mechanical or electronic games that can become, in their turn, obsessive components that populate, all the way to the limit of resistance, the mind and its cognitive and affective horizon. And if alcohol or games can conquer the mental horizon, then basically any content, from stamp collection to tattoos, or certain magazines to numerology, shelves stacked with shoes

4 For the amplification of the exposed idea, we reffer to: Gozo, Z. (2013), The Modern

Man between Existence and Possession.


or overloaded with books to luxury cars collection or even tanks, all of these and many others can become supports or hooks for a mental tableau, so individually invested that it seems downright personal. And every time such a personalization is present, implicit and strong emotional attachments appear and assemble in true addictions that tie down and close the mental horizon, encapsulating the individual in their wrap. Such encapsulations rapidly and insidiously become limitations, even drawbacks which result in the excluding of everything that does not belong to the own mental horizon. The limitative closures easily end up at their own centre of gravity, a preferential area towards which all the preoccupations converge, and so it is of no surprise to us that there is an exaggerated accentuation only of that certain horizon, and as a consequence excluding all that is in no connection with the personal mental tableau. Surprisingly, the exclusion works so well that it makes the outcast items (held however at a respectable distance in the subliminal) to become unacceptable for the self that permanently relates itself to the reference marks and values of the collective universe; as a consequence, the ones mentioned above become outright inexistent as possible cognitive alternatives for that certain mind that is engaged in a by excellence reductionist epistemology. This way, the exclusion becomes cancelling, voiding anything that cannot be brought or reduced to personal reference points, schemes, interests or values – anything that is different from the limitations of its own universe as well as the universe of its own limitations must, in this light, be excluded, disregarded and anathematized.

The traditionalist vision of re-production There is a wide-spread and deeply rooted opinion of the specular

character of the visual arts that expresses itself through the candid question of the way too innocent beholder: “But, what does this mean?” or, in humbler register “What is this supposed to be?” As if, apart from a bunch of coloured lines or specks harmoniously arranged on a flat surface (paper, wood or canvas) there, in the picture, could also be sheep or goats, people or clouds or any other object of the surrounding world respectively. All this narrow-unilateral and touchingly simplistic conception dates back to the desire of realism specifically manifested in the visual arts of Renaissance towards the Impressionism of the 19th century. The generally accepted idea was that the artist strives (with the help of lineal and chromatic perspective, the attentive observation and


measurement of objects and the relations between them, with the help of the theory of colours, the proportional drawing and artistic anatomy) to portray something from the surrounding world as it is in reality – the picture was considered to be a faithful mirror of reality. People actually believed that reality or at least a part of it, can be taken (miraculously apparently) by the artist (probably with his inherent force of his genius) and (trans) posed on the canvas, even though it also remained there, in the actual space, unaffected by the amazing prestidigitation of the painter (a copy here and a move here, as the computer “would say”). It was too easily left aside the fact that in the case of a painting, we can only talk about pictorial language and not at all of a recreation of reality that would let itself, by the eye and hand of the talented artist, be taken from its place, copied just to be transposed on a canvas. The art, beyond being a reflection of reality, has a freestanding existence, being almost as descriptive and as realistic as a Balzacian novel or a Debussy composition. Of course, we do not claim of having said anything new so far, the artistic critique having delineated, analyzed and detailed all these aspects a long time ago in numerous studies – maybe too sophisticated and specialized. However, such analyses have remained unclear or even unknown for the collective mental and one can still hear people having opinions about the famous and controversial Gioconda5.

Regarding the Renaissance painting, it could also be observed that, opposite to the Byzantine one, from which it detached in Trecento and Quattrocento, it sharply emphasizes the concern of the third dimension – the depth of the painting – which it manages to suggest through various means (lineal and chromatic perspective, proportionality etc.). We underline here this very important aspect for our discussion, especially because we talk, in the case of perspectival painting, about a suggested depth – actually an illusion that deceives the eyes of the beholder – that

5“I don’t know but, I don’t like it, she’s ugly!” is the standard referral that is made in nonchalantly, addressed obviously to the depicted woman – Madonna Lisa Del Giocondo or Madonna Lisa Gherardini, after the opinion of Giorgio Vasari – about the painting of Leonardo da Vinci. And because almost everyone sees the (ugly) woman in the picture, nobody manages to see the perfection of the picture of the overwhelming and absolute renaissance genius. It is amazing though, how much resilience has such perspective embedded in a conception about life and world (perturbed, we would say, also by a lot of emotional subliminal) the more that we have for about five centuries a history and a critique of visual arts (from Vasari and Alberti) next to a pictorial development and enrichment that accompanies and parallelizes but does not reproduce specularly-photographic the history of Western humanity.


no matter how hard he tried, he cannot manage to go beyond the pictorial space (as we will see in the following). In other words, the Byzantism, which was not interested in perspective (that could even be reversed, like in the case of the books held by some saint) or proportionality (only if it served to the emphasis, just like in the case in which the saint is much bigger than the laypersons represented), was continued, at least in the West, by the Renaissance that remarkably accentuates these issues, granting to the depth of the painting an important role in the ensemble of a composition that wishes to reproduce the reality as faithfully as possible (for preponderantly and decisively illustrating the talent of the artist and less the correspondence with any reality). But no matter how much depth was added, the Renaissance painting ultimately remained flat, smooth and two-dimensional. Depth, yes (at least illusory), but by no means was there profoundness. The painting seems to be enriched with a dimension (suggested by the artistic craft), but this being only a delusion of the eye, that cannot in fact get past the canvas’ flat surface. And this seems to also be inherent to a certain framing of a mental tableau that seems to have depth but proves to be, at a closer look, a pure illusion; the depth is not necessary equivalent to profoundness because the former is just suggested, it being the depth of a display window, a pseudo-depth after all, and lacking the background that a genuine third dimension gives.

Productions and reproductions We shall discuss in the following the concepts of adult, grown up and

maturing as well as their relating to some highlights and illustrations taken from the history of Western picture. Because we must state this from the beginning, the mental tableau of the adult, with all its psychological undergrounds together with its opinions and conceptions about life, can be discussed and illustrated, compared to, parallelized respectively, depending on its different stages, with past centuries’ paintings, from the 15th century’s Renaissance to the 19th century’s Realism. We are talking here about the central idea of Realism, the objective reproduction of reality, be it on the canvas or in the human mind. Both at the pictorially level and adult-psychologically level, it is considered that what we see and what we reproduce, pictorially or mentally, it is indeed the reality as it is in itself. The most prevailing


impression is that our mind forms a faithful mirror of reality6, a flawless recreation of what we see as existing in the real world. Even more than that, the adult believes that the picture he creates about reality, world, others etc. – his mental landscape or horizon – is not only some recreation of reality, but a downright faithful copy of it, corresponding, point by point, with what it is, as it is. The confusion between what can be found outside, in the surrounding world, and what can be found inside the mind seems persistent in the most widespread conceptions about the world – “But I have seen it with my own eyes!” one can hear somebody saying with the most unmistakable tone – introducing even a circularity between interiority and exteriority7, the two seeming so congruent and isomorphic that they are inconceivable as separately and independently. As if it were not enough, the adult also abuses this “faithful recreation” that he has about reality, through interpreting and reinterpreting it, more or less forced or just circumstantial, to match the idiosyncrasies of his mental sketches, it seems that he has to adapt everything to his own sketches (these also being basally predetermined by the level by excellence collective which imposes them). The adult will never question, will never doubt the reality of the image or idea that he has in his mind – that really is his reality and there is no difference between outside and inside, the congruency between exterior and interior is self-understood as more so as it is generally accepted and universally validated (in his affiliated group). It is just that, many times, is hard to identify which

6 What helps us here are the resemblances we heard in childhood between the eye and the photographic camera and lately between the mind and the computer, that seemed to be catching and explaining with only one word mechanisms that until then were complex and inexplicable. It is too easily forgotten, in such “explicative” contexts, that humans are caught, just like the Renaissance painters in an enclosed horizon of their era. All the explanations and theories that we can give are limited by the cognitive level reached in the era we live in, they cannot surpass this threshold (maybe only through some geniuses that are neither understood nor accepted). So the chariot with which Ilie heightens, in front of Elisei’s eyes, towards heaven (from the Old Testament) becomes, in a contemporary lecture (Erich von Däniken in his “Flashbacks from the future”), nothing more and nothing less but an UFO. Incredibly subtle also is the movie Jumnji, where two kids find themselves in front of a homonym game when the pieces start to move by themselves, and the boy says: “It must be something related to magnets.” – explanations given by a kid form the 60s; over 30 years later the same pieces that move on the board game receive from another kid the explanation: “It must be something with microchips.”.

7 Developing the idea of “Interiority-Exteriority” is found in the article: Gozo, Z. (2015), INTERIORITY AND EXTERIORITY searching for self.


factors are decisive in the fixation of some credible ideas or conceptions, the inward ones – the subjective – or the outward ones – the ones amidst people, because no matter how realistically would a picture or a photograph mirror reality, there is still room for interpretation (just like those so different landscapes painted by impressionist friends that looked at the same horizon, respectively the same reality). And here intervenes the personalized aspect of the picture, the one that gives the feeling that there are possible variations on the topic of reality, and that there is a personal and personalized image of the world. But, even this one has in its turn an indubitable collective character, predetermined in its turn by the extended idiosyncrasy but overall intrinsic to the human species, that has, regardless of race, tribe or affiliation, the same brain structure and almost the same mode of mind operation.

The preliminary stages of evolution towards the formation of the mental tableau of the adult are the child and the pubescent, and these can be compared to the longstanding totemic tradition of the byzantine picture (that endlessly reproduces the same patterns) and all the efforts of separation from this realization made by the masters, more or less naive, of the Italian Trecento or even the Quattrocento. The adolescent attempts appear only later on, and resemble, in our assertion, with the Renaissance picture that is full of discoveries that acutely split from the rigorous patterns of the byzantine art. In these “youth” stages filled with curiosities, discoveries and unsettling questions of a journey beginning, we can reckon that the basement and bearings of adult mental horizon are decided, and whose mental tableau will be as more complex as greater his curiosity and knowledge thirst was. Surely, each individual has at his disposal personalized options (variations of reality’s reproduction), his mental picture can be of Renaissance, Mannerist, Baroque, Romantic, Naturalistic or Realistic kind; he can “paint”, or re-produce respectively the world just as a Rafael, Rembrandt, Ribera or Courbet would. The mental picture of the adult can present itself in a series of shapes and variants: it can contain the mystery of “The Virgin Of The Rocks” or the almost maniacal precision of a (self) portrait by Dürer, it can appear dynamically to the eye as Rubens’ “Tiger Hunt” or it can have the serenity of “The Allegory of Painting” by Vermeer8. What matters mostly

8 The enumerations above are just exemplifications for our thesis; we don’t discuss

here the plastic value of some works and much less that of an artist. No matter where the


in this discussion is not the style or manner in which the mental tableau of the adult can appear, since it can be treated as diversely as the history of European painting of 500 years shows but the fact that the human cannot identify any difference between the objectual of the object and the reproduction of the object in the objectual of the painting, and so, the tri-dimensional reality of beings and objects of the world and the two-dimensional reality of the picture seem to be congruent and concordant, with no inadvertence existing between them, only in the case of an unsuccessful or willingly deformed recreation (kind of like those belonging to the Mannerist paintings). In this opinion, the map is the copy or faithful reproduction of the territory, as the territory seems to be following exactly the indications of the map drawing. The orientation of the individual, in this case, throughout the world and life, cannot come with many surprises since people have a map (a GPS lately) and any map (re)produces and covers a (already known) reality. Returning to our parallel, the remaining unknown for the adult is minimal and negligible, and it is not even worth being treated as a serious question or interrogation; the territory of the known seems to be entirely mapped, the remaining white spots being truly insignificant and could always be completed with facile sub-implications, everything seeming clear and well known, nothing could alter, attack or unsettle the homeostasis of the mental. The great questions and unknown of the adolescence as the fascinations or dreams of childhood have been covered and forgotten (it is like they never existed), and the adult has arrived on a territory of the predictable, of the already known, his picture finished, the colours dried, the only thing remaining is to be varnished and framed for display. Once framed in a solid frame that both comprises and limits it, encloses it but highlights it, the tableau of the adult becomes (at least superficially) personal and apart, separated or cut-out from the greater reality, detached (artistically of course, but inevitably artificially) from it, just perfect to be hung on the wall of a personal ex-position. From now on, the tableau is his reality, just like it has to be to facilitate a comfortable and predictable life, full of the small pleasures of wellbeing that come to compensate the small inconveniences of life. And these accomplishments of every adult present themselves and ex-pose themselves at absolutely all their social meetings that become a stroll through a gallery of tableaus, the collective

comparisons and exemplifications situate them, the artists above are some of the greatest, and nobody could contest their overwhelming artistic merit.


ex-position where everyone comes up with his own style and manner of tableau which are more or less original. And as every painter is a very good and attentive critic of other painters’ works (as all the philosophers do), as well those who stroll through the gallery of tableaus see much clearly the straw in the neighbour’s “tableau” than the beam in his own landscape. But, as these things occur systemically, the general effect of critiques amortizes and cancels through a perfect circularity that does not allow any other movement outside the horizon of appreciation and/or self-adulation of the same tableaus. The landscapes or tableau are admired or critiqued, appreciated or ignored, but nobody question themselves about what are they hiding, what their purpose is, what is there behind them and behind the tendency or persistence to create, frame, expose or endlessly comment upon the same detached slices of reality. And it is exactly in this point, when visiting the tableaus from an exposition, are generally engaged and solidified, if not ossified certain conceptions registered or comprised by a particular style, specific perspective that rapidly and subtly become irrevocable and inalterable conceptions about the world and life and how they must be. Because, repeatedly telling and presenting the same tableau, the man infuses his “artistic creation” with more and more ontos, and so it becomes more and more representative for what he himself is and, as a consequence, the convergence between what exists in the mind, respectively in the tableau and reality becomes harder and harder to distinguish. In fact we are considering a creation and a psychological genesis, full of emotionality, attachments and dependency, of one-sided opinion ineluctably coupled with various perspective effects and defects that inevitably result after such a process. The mental picture, once created and especially after being varnished, framed and exposed, cannot be corrected, remade or destroyed and easily replaced, it obtains a self-sustained existence, not only in the personal mental and the tableaus gallery, but also in the mental of those to whom it was presented to. The exuberant exposition from the exhibit of youth is transformed, easily and discreetly, in a dusty but peremptory gallery of a venerable museum; the individual, put on his own pedestal solidifies in an (auto) adulated adult that does not possess at all the ability to “adultize”.

How can someone get stuck (in a project!) is hard to understand. But, following some psychological paths we can at least sketch the mechanism of this itinerary that suddenly wakes up in the middle of the road without being able to continue his path. In the course of evolution, from birth until


20 years old, the mental tableau of the individual completes itself with elements (just like a puzzle), more often based on the Zeigarnik9 effect that succeeds or at least tries to cover the angst cause by the unknown, by the blank spot on the mental territory map; the missing piece is the one that does not give us rest until we find it and put it in its place. Once we succeeded this, we calm down, everything is fine, we can start searching for the next missing piece for the next blank spot, an ongoing operation until everything is complete, our canvas fully covered, there is no empty space, the unknown has vanished, the nothingness has been covered and the angst has no corner to creep through and to trouble the status quo of the adult being. The dimension of our canvas and of our mental tableau respectively, are preponderantly given by the collective frames in which we grew up and in which were perpetuated all the stereotypes, common laws, beliefs, aspirations and hopes or ready-made ideas of the “tribe”. Our canvas cannot be how big or in whatever form we want it, but it shall present itself already formatted, according to the norms and schemes that have been imprinted on us since children. These give us the structure – the Gestalt – that secures us, hiding the existential angst under the “objectification” of the picture, covering the background on which the pieces of the puzzle come to sit on and cover up. And once the tableau is finished and all the elements have found their place, it can be exhibited in the gallery to be admired by others (that of course have their own tableaus ready to be admired…). This exposure is in the same time an ex-posure, everything is now on the wall of the gallery, objectified by externalization, more or less outside of ourselves. It is a thing we barely have access to, and that becomes self-sufficient and so every new viewing and/or commentary only gives it more ontos, certifies it more and more in its auto-nomy, it completely engages it in its inexorable and peremptory fixity and immutability. In consequence, our small masterpiece – as an achievment of the adult life – does not require any other intervention, maybe only another frame (more opulent with the improvement of the financial situation) or another light (brighter with the improvement of the same financial situation). We can understand therefore the said ingrained constancy of these mental tableaus of some individuals who believe that once they finished school there is nothing left to learn because from now

9 The name of this effect comes from the gestaltist psychologist Bluma Wulfovna

Zeigarnik that states that people remember more easily the incomplete, interrupted, or un-finalized processes, than the completed or finished processes. (Zeigarnik, 1927, p. 1-85).


on they know everything, because they are adults, right? They believe they placed all the pieces of the puzzle, Mrs. Zeigarnik was overall, content, all the responses to the stringent questions have been given, everything has been labelled (with big and clear letters, free of unsettling ambiguities, suspect interrogations, dubious uncertainties); the world is from now on a known sea, framed by some solid operational schemes and, as a consequence, it can be manipulated to satisfy to the brim the diehard constancy of the principle of pleasure.

We shall remember, in this context, Otto Rank who contemplated that the need of psychological knowledge is not exactly charitable or altruistic (as it would seem on a first and edulcorated view) but the individual is looking for knowledge (more so the psychological one) to exert his control, the power over the object, the know subject respectively (Rank, 1950). We have this need because, otherwise, the being or the unknown state of things “posed” schemingly and provocatively in my face could control me, could have power over me through the angst, unsettledness or at least the questions that attracts solely through its presence. So, shortly, I want the control given by knowledge to cover the threat of angst, the void or the unknown. I want a mental tableau completed to detail, a realistic one, but also fitted with all the necessary elements rendered in their concreteness just like a puzzle that is found complete, with all its pieces fitted together; all of these to fill the void that otherwise I would see on the anguishing blank surface. The knowledge (the thirst for knowledge) is not just a “je veux savoir” matter, but, the basal angst in its chronicity, discovered in front of every unknown of the surrounding world (that because of the fact that it is unknown, so it is income-prehensible, causes unsettlement and anxieties), it is the one that starts the hermeneutic engine of epistemic search that must cover and at the same time hide the faceless surface of the unknown. Once I know and have the answers, I have eliminated the questions and the unknowns respectively, I can master both the inward forum of my mental “landscape” and the reality of the world because I have made a copy that, once mimicked, it can be found with the carrier. And that is why we see so many struggles to create this copy, the transposition of the real being made in a known and familiar reality, formatted alongside our schemes of collective extraction in such a way that it is manoeuvrable and controllable because it is, ultimately, com-prehensible. As a consequence, we cannot live in the big outside (to us) world (concretely and properly), but we need (re)productions of this, recreations in our own head, mental landscapes or


tableau to which to get attached because they are our own, we tie ourselves to them meanwhile building, elaborating them, finding the correspondent piece or putting the right name on a label. With time, they become pièces de résistance of the spirit, ideas with which we identify until the complete erasure of the possibility of individuation (of Jungian10 origin).

Parallel between the evolution of visual arts and the post-adult

mental development The transition from adult to mature could be compared (cum grano

salis, of course) to the evolution of Western painting from the Realism, before the French Impressionism, to the 20th century’s movements. Let us take a look, from this perspective, to the Impressionism which, after surpassing the Realism of a Courbet or Corot, wanted to paint mainly the light reflected from objects and not the objects in their “solidity” or concreteness. For Impressionists, the objects of the reality were nothing more than mere things that reflected light, sources of colour later transposed on a canvas. It is the first step in overcoming the realist limitation: the painting is not looking for a faithful reflection of a reality; it does not create something solid and objective, but only the surface of objects, meaning what the eye of the painter perceives in the matter of light and colour. Painting achieves to recreate not the said reality, but the impression (impressionistic and subjective, of course) of the artist given by his contact with a certain décupage from reality. Impressionism introduces, in the context of the parallel discussed here, the first step of coming of age (coming to maturity), that being: the study and questioning of what am I doing when I am perceiving and reproducing something; it does not import exactly the faithfulness of a mental reproduction of a certain reality or the loyal reproduction of its objects, but only the procedural modality involved in this operation. The question is not how realistic is my reproduction, but how well it reproduces my own impressions. From now on, what is important is the faithfulness towards perception – over which the artist reflects, just like the adult beginning his road to maturity – induced by a certain slice of reality. Everything is being reduced to a slight alienation from the tradition of specular art,

10 “Individuation is, generally, a formation and particularization process of the

individual, especially of psychological development of the individual as a distinct from the collective psychology being”. (Jung, 1997, p. 487).


accomplished through an attentive analysis of what our sense organs perceive when we leave aside our mental contents (full of stereotypes, legends, inherited but never verified explanations, and all sorts of other common places we are, more or less, aware of) towards the reality around us –an epoché avant la lettre we could say.

The Pointillism, as a natural continuation of Impressionistic exploration, only brought further the procedural analysis of the picture, landing to the decomposition of touches up to the level of some colourful dots of which could hardly be said they have anything to do with the represented object. And as if this was not enough, the colourful dots revealed in some places the white surface of the canvas – the support of the picture, the place where it was manifested respectively, for the eyes of the beholder, the chromatic game of the iridescent specks that we would call pixels nowadays. For our discussion, Post-Impressionism made not only disappear, dissolve or simply pulverize the recreated “object”, but indicated, un-appealable, that everything that appears (for the eyes of the viewer), appears on a white surface, on a work prop that is only a flat surface (two-dimensional) that cannot be connected to the tri-dimensional reality of the world. We are now far away, through an accurate phenomenological analysis of perception, from the specular Realism that the Renaissance was proud of, we are anchored in the attentive analysis of our own perceptions that, apparently can be decomposed and rearranged following the internal rules of composition of the painting, of our own mental creation respectively. From now on, it is not the world and it’s objectuality that dictate how the picture is supposed to look like, but the artist is the one who conceives a very intricate composition (like in the case of Seurat, for example) that, once finished, wants to be separated from the relation with the real and enthroned in the pictorial space of a painting, a purely mental creation, belonging, without any ambiguity, to the third Popperian world (Popper, 1997). Transposing, we can infer that the law of composition of the (mental) tableau is dictated by the individual and it is applied to the reality he conceives and organizes congruently with his inner requests. The domination of the real over the human mind, through the incursions made by impressionism and pointillism, has ended and its place was taken by the artist with his inspiration that can dictate the frame, composition or colour of the visible world clothing. In the evolution of the Western spirit, such a step would be translated through the disjuncture form the attachment of recreating objects as we had them encrypted in our minds (the horse is brown, the


apple is red, the grass in green etc.) in favour of emphasizing what and how we actually see with our eyes and not with the eyes of our mind. Basically, less projection on the reality in favour of recording it as it is presented to our sense organs – the initiation of a phenomenological process of searching for the essences of perception, free from the burden of cheap and facile stereotypical intellectualizations, enthroned by the custom of ready-made ideas and the ancestral rites of Universalist doxas. We are talking here about the rethinking and individualization of the perception’s data which, once filtered and processed by a maturing mind, will be integrated in the mental structure of an individual whom surpasses the territory of habitual milestones of the adult.

Cubism makes an even more daring leap toward the laws that govern the painting. The recreated object is reshaped by the artist not after its proportions or its outlines, but after the internal requests and the force strokes inherent of a painting’s composition. The Cubist painter breaks and rampages any solidity or proportion of the objects only to remake and re-create them from pieces and fragments according not to their reality or any biunivocal correspondence with it, but for the sole purpose to create a successful composition in which the elements of the picture take their places (desired by the artist). There is a massive intervention taking place regarding the concreteness of the real coupled with the analysis of it (we refer here to an analytic Cubism) in all its facets from which the artist chooses, in his taste and inspiration, the elements that he needs to make a composition. From now on, the inward mental tableau of the individual is the one that imprints on reality and not the other way around. The objects are being manipulated without qualms because we are no longer attached to them; the individual dictates what he chooses or leaves aside from the material with which the world presents itself, he himself is master of the composition he executes, he coordinates its drawing, composition and colour according to his own tastes and necessities without letting himself be rallied in the automatic stereotypes of “this is how it’s done”. From now on it is the inward reality that imposes to the outward reality – in the disjunction physis versus psyche the latter won because finally, the individual self can impose its own rules of inward composition to the world he perceives. Expressionism and Fauvism come to add to the analysis and rational (re)construction of Cubism, the internal emanation of the artist’s emotionality that appends or overlaps with the reality (re)produced on the surface of the canvas. The lyricism of the pictorial construction appears to be almost exclusively


dominated by the emotional state, the composition folds according to the requests of the feelings and emotions in such a way that the picture becomes the material expression of inward reality; the objects of reality are nothing but pretexts for the projection of the affects, feelings, states or dominant emotions of the artist. The real ignites emotional states that are externalized through painting which denotes an alienation from the dependency and the mingling towards the world, and the more and more serious anchorage in an inward reality many times built even in opposition to what we perceive (the blue or green horses of Franz Marc, for example). From these elaborations it results that reality can withstand the shaping by the individual that comes with the force of his passions to deform and rebuild something that seemed so solidly anchored in its objectuality. In other words, reality folds in front of the necessities resulted from the human soul; it withstands any attack on its internal structure. The objects of the world are mere pretexts for the expression of the individual’s interiority who, precisely through his feelings instills life and animates the existence of the items with which he operates, giving them the only ontological chance they have. Heretofore, hermeneutics can become creating in an ontological sense.

Around the same time (afore the First World War) we see Kandinski experimenting with the first abstract water colours that detach, for the first time, the spirit from the concreteness and materialistic recreation of the world’s objects. Following this operation, only the internal laws of the painting remain: specks of colour, draws, dots or circles arranged according to the requisites of the composition and the sentimental disposition of the painter; everything is thought out to avail a harmonious whole that relegates to an abstract reality (maybe a sort of Platonian ideas) found beyond the bodies, objects, or beings of the world we know with the help of our senses. Referring to Kandinski, we cannot talk anymore about the recreation of a reality, but only about an ab initio of a reality, secluded, it’s true, – that is of the painting. Along with the abstract painting, the individual has the possibility to part with the world of the objects for entering in the spiritual one, the access unto the Platonian-like realism is opened once and for all (after twenty-four centuries post Plato, at the western European level). The severance from the concrete materiality of the landscape given by reality is made by introducing this time the idea of the mental tableau that presents itself in all its abstractness. For creating, just like for existing and functioning in the world, the human does not require anymore that imperative need to


conform to the real – as it is perceived, framed and shared by everyone, but he can engage from now on, even by himself, in the ideas slot that give the measure of what it is truly real. A creation eminently introvert, the maturation of the adult individual consists also, just like in the case of Kandinski’s paintings, in the separation from the objects of concrete and standardized thinking (even if it is for centuries). Or, such separation, that also involves the capacity of a clear differentiation between the data collected in the mind, is realized through leaping into the abstract, understood here especially as an abstraction from the much too concrete data of the collective mental – existential transmutation of the mental operating frameworks through transcending the immanent of the real as it is generally painted by the effective norms and behaviours.

Dadaism11 divulges the whole conventionality of our relations with the real next to the contingency and the absurd of these. The mental tableau completely breaks away from the world’s concreteness because the later reveals to the artist as being eminently absurd and thus interpretable (because it is, by excellence, conventional) in all its meaning or the lack of it. The useful necessity of a bottle blow-dryer or a urinal, once exhibited in a gallery, sees itself abused towards annulment to make room for, in an iconoclast way, the contingency that is laid, basically, on every object (especially if it has been upraised to the art title). Whether we are talking about the ready-mades of Duchamp (free or fortuitous, it is hard to say) or the double, triple or multiple portraits of Picabia, everything leads to an emphasized deconstruction of the conventional space of the idea of a painting (as it was conceived starting with Renaissance). The gratuitousness of reality’s recreation is not even a discussion topic anymore, the recreation of objects, never so much as, because the work has become object or, like in the above mentioned ready-mades, we do not even know what we are talking about anymore: the ordinary object transformed in a work of art or, on the contrary, the work of art has become ordinary or, maybe even the idea of art (as we classically

11 The idea of Tristan Tzara that initiates at Zurich, in 1918 this absolute movement

that regards the force of negating all the stated values of the western civilization, the Dadaism appears on the ruins of a Europe torn apart by the Great War (as it was named at that time) that destroyed all hopes for the cultural values of the west. The emotional and spiritual disaster of the continent were immeasurable, measured not only by the millions of lost, destroyed or amputated lives, but maybe more by the loss of hope in the humanity of the human, in the capacity of the westerner to manage the great affairs of life, economy and politics.


understand it) sees itself paradoxically evacuated directly from the empire of artistic creation… through an artistic act. The osmosis between the objective reality of the world and the one in the creation of the artist is absolute, and so, with one move, the distance between the two worlds is cancelled. The analysis made by the Dadaism refers to the reality as it is generally perceived; the objects are one by one arranged in their box – utilitarian, artistic, etc. But these are nothing but the categories necessary to the adult’s mind who wants everything in its place. A process of iterative maturity nevertheless implies a constant interrogation of the world objects’ status, and, especially of their quartering in the categories of one’s own mental. Basically, the Duchampian ready-mades defy any definition; they are an insult to the manic of categorization that would get rid of any arising challenge by putting them in a box sorted depending on the label’s note. Why would we artistically recreate objects when we have so many things at our disposal and we could use them even in an artistic way? The interrogation regarding the mental tableau is, in this case, extremely massive and crushing because it brings up the gratuitous rapport that we have with the reality, laid bare up to its final contingency. The individual realizes his conventional rapport with thinks around him, of the fact that the values he assigned were more or less socially desirable and that his life glided by in a universe much too human, warm and comfortable, but entirely artificial, segregated from any existential solidity. The Dadaist could be, in the context of our discussion, compared to the individual that gets upset (existentially, of course) and rebels against his eminently conventional and comfortable, predictable and limited position, that can continue only in a redundant boring way. This is the moment when the human being realizes for the first time (Western civilization speaking, of course) that life cannot follow the course of some homeostasis that reiterates automatically, he realizes that his existence so far needs a leap, he realizes that something broke in his way of being and perceiving, that he has to start all over because he finally reached the point zero of any ethic. For, if Dadaism had a valuable contribution, it is exactly in this profound realization and put forward of the maximum inflection point that fractures the whole epistemological, ethical, axiological, hermeneutical system. We refer here to an existential driven to an “absolute zero”, it cannot be further or lower, the limit of resistance has been reached and the state of affairs must change from now on. Dadaism, which is actually a deadlock (both artistically and existentially), does not put forward solutions, it is in the exact same situation as the


individual who has reached the middle of life, for whom the process of individualization has pretty much ended and who should start, slowly, thoughtfully and patiently, the individuation uphill (as rightly pointed by C.G. Jung). Once completed (on the process of individualization), the realization of the self indubitably becomes complete, through a process that, once finished, grabbed with it all the fascinosum so far; what has lasted (at least in the case of the individuals that realize what is going on with them and their life) is nothing but a huge disappointment and desperation, a lot of depression and pessimism that astoundingly resembles to the nigredo on which the great alchemists of the past insisted on. Dadaism, through its inherent iconoclasm, comes to point, sharply and boldly, the existential caesura that appears when we (finally) admit the conventionality of attachments, values and our mundane expectancies, it comes to mark, desperately and dramatically, that the life of the adult cannot go on by repeating and respecting the same guiding marks, schemes or aspirations; a whole (mentally, of course) universe is about to crumble to make room for a cynic epistemic, hermeneutical and axiological re-evaluation coming from ethical interrogations and dispairs unmasked not even by cheap and handy deontologies.

Surrealism comes, with its name, to superimpose the reality, respectively to lay above the Realism through the insertion of the oneiric component together with all the subliminal phenomena already investigated by the Freudian psychoanalysis. Along with this artistic movement, a sharp accent is put on, almost exclusively on the inner idea, image or phantasm, any outter element being reduced to what it already is: a mere exteriority (that can only give elements or crutches, Dalinian maybe, to the personal mental tableau). The faithfulness of recreation towards which the artist aspires is the inner reality one, of unconscious origin, to which he exercises his (sur)realism. We have, through this moment of human evolution, a complete disposal of the barriers of realism, centered on the reality understood as a solid and immutable exteriority, through an immersion, tête en avans, in the inner world, a discovery of the unconscious universe which will be for the first time explored systematically and zealously together with an implementation of said discoveries, by painters, poets, novelists or movie directors (after closely watching Bosh, Breughel, Arcimboldo, Piranesi, or later Goya). This time, the reproduction or mirroring is applied from the psychical reality, a superior level of abstractisation, of detachment, of distancing from the objective reality of the world, basically the conquest of an


independence opposite the seeable and palpable universe through the instauration of the oneiric laws. Or, such a level is to be reached only on a maturation spiral seen as an ascending evolution on the spirit’s steps and its potentiality. The detachment from the concrete reality, as it is or was presented to us in the educational process in upstream by the adult state, is certainly a decisive step of freeing the spirit, an emancipation from apparently indelible ties given by the intricate networks and knots of the collective stereotypical pressures. A placing of the mind on the level of supra-reality is needed, at the interrogative and completely conscious call of the unspecific channels on the lode of attentive and serious analysis of one’s own existential placing, of the boarding in the cognitive reality from the epistemological perspective of what can I know and comprehend? and also of what is the source of information I rely on?, from where have they appeared and “situated” in my mind?, what is my relationship with them?, to what degree am I capable of making them relative?, to see them with a critic or even paranoiac-critic of Dalinian extraction, detached eye and, last but not least, if am I capable to rectify, complete, modify or even abandon them, in case they prove to be inadequate, anachronistic, obsolete or useless. Surrealism, through its works, has shown us that the psychical reality has not only ontos, but can also come as an alternative of the external one (in the moment of total abandonment of connecting to the world given by the habitual conformism), a solution that ultimately anchors alternatively from a parallel world full of inspiration and profoundly offering regarding the liberality offered to the spirit. For, according to Jung, the “location” of self and the great archetypes (Jung, 2003), so necessary in the course of individuation process of the second half of life, is found in the unconscious (especially in the collective one) so frequently accessed and depicted by surrealists. We now have two realities maybe parallel, maybe secant that offer reading ways of what we assume to be the real in a hermeneutics that doubles the possibility of interpreting the world with bench-marks taken both from the external reality and the internal one. The complete denial of the conventional rapports with the reality, given by Dadaism was necessary as reducing to zero the occidental axiological system; once the terrain was “cleaned” by the centuries of obedient tradition and faithful mirroring of the real, the surrealism could easily come up with a completely new scheme of approach from a domain already fertilized by Freud and his exploration of dreams. Everything that was contemptible and marginalized by the rational culture (at least as a general tendency) of Western Europe of Illuminist extraction, was


prioritized to be put on the plate of the balance of psyche and human cognition. By this step, the ensemble of human knowledge possibilities was at least doubled through the add-on that came from the unconscious; the unbalanced scale towards the rationalist plate by the two centuries stuffed with illuminist culture regains balance through the weight of the plate, lacking rationality it is true, but full of subconscious’ activities: dream, inspiration, fantasy, creativity, intuition etc.

Even if Surrealism was a huge step forward which was first understood as a possibility of self differentiation and of finding its “location”, the great strike in the 20th12 century’s visual arts’ history, but also in the spiritual opening of the individual on an ontogenetic ladder, came from an Italian artist named Lucio Fontana. The fact that he painted monochrome canvases was not a novelty (another contemporary of his, Yves Klein did it too, with his “monochrome bleu”), but the act of cutting the canvas with a blade comes as a massive and unexpected derail both for the idea of painting, with the classic and never questioned surface of the picture, and for the context in which we try to draw progressions on the path of maturation and individuation. However, the monochrome canvas, just a flat surface on which formerly appeared horses, lions, flowers or hunters, remains the only visible thing of the painting, this time its shape being mistaken for the background and so the later ultimately becomes the shape of a painting that offers itself to countless circumstances of interpretation in an limitless idealistic liberty. The surface laid before our eyes is not populated with anything anymore, its colour, no matter what that is, could ultimately be inexistent, because the canvas itself comes with a certain tint (even if it is of the primer). If Fontana comes and makes a cut or more (even holes, later on) it creates, alongside the two-dimensional space of the canvas, a new dimension, one that searches to open the picture towards profoundness13. Such overture

12 We leave aside, in consciousness of the case, the abstract painting or the informal one (from the middle of the 20th century) as well as some comebacks to the classicism of a De Chirico or even Picasso, from around the same time, to not fill with data the present paper, more so because, from our point of view, it would not help the present analysis very much.

13 It was not useless the way Gilles Neret concluded, saying that Fontana was born in the country where the painters were never satisfied with the flat surface of the picture and as a consequence they invented the perspective, respectively they added to the two-dimensional conventional space the dimension of depth. In the definition given by Fontana himself, his spatiality is: “Nor a painting, nor a sculpture, no spatial demarcation lines, but the continuity of the space in the matter”. In this way, after five


sends the vision and the ideation just behind the area traditionally covered by realist landscapes, the still lives in trompe l’oeil, the “identically natural” portraits or heroic scenes detached from the historic reality as it was… The space behind the picture suddenly becomes visible or, thanks to the intense shadows, at least its presence is being guessed, which is rather secretively indicated or suggested. To paint a monochrome canvas is already a huge step in the direction of abstracting not only of the picture, but also of the idea of picture together with all the artistic craft and virtuosity, but to allow to see what it is behind the painting shockingly asks the question: “Where is the painting actually?”. There, in the profoundness of the third dimension, there, in the darkness that percolates from the wall which is nevertheless a support on which the picture is hung to interrupt the planarity of the canvas laid on the chassis, there I said, where dwells an unfathomable, suspect, intriguing and mysterious “beyond” because it is, par excellence, indication and adequate source for what the philosophers call angst, and the psychologists the anxiety full of unspeakable worries. The violent cuts made to the canvas – to the two-dimensional level –come to unravel the shadow, the darkness, the mysterious and the unknown. In fact, behind the picture could be anything, from a white wall to a coloured one, another spatial (two) dimension that could possibly hide a history incomparably more abstracted from reality than any other abstract painting. What seems to be behind the “spatial” works of Fontana is the guessing, the ineffable mystery of the unconscious populated with anything we can imagine. After or beyond the painting is, it’s true, a wall that stops me from going forward, a wall that limits the possibilities of the intellect of exploring more and which maintains in a particular area of a rather conceived reality. But, the wall towards which the Fontanian cut’s shadow spreads, comes not only as a limitation or even a blockage of endless exploration possibilities, it attracts to maintain the sight in the area of the unsaid, of the hard-to-understand with all its mysteriously unsettling and easily distressed inclinations. The wall that we see or, better said, guess through the cut, both opens and closes the demarche of the mind caught in the trap of a genuine double constraint – no matter what we do, we are trapped in a deceitful jeu sans fin which we cannot end easily through cheap and shallow conventional rationalizations. Above that, the wall

centuries from the invention of perspective in Italy, an Italian bases the passing over the bi-dimensional.


behind the painting, being also a support for the latter, is generally painted by somebody who is somewhat of a failed painter that did not reach, in his professional evolution, the level of great art. Thus, through Fontanian caesuras, we have the meeting and even communion between colouring with paint and painting, between decorator and painter, between craftsman and artist respectively. A sudden and subtle meeting between what was considered of rank and what has stayed humble amid a fertile osmosis of background and shape. Opening and shutting, attracting and limiting through the apertures executed on a surface that immediately and directly sends towards another surface, the Italian artist manages to keep intact the idea of angst that opens up, through and from the slitting of the canvas, in the uninterrupted dialectical of “the other side” and “this that side”, of hither and away, here and/or there. Through these operations and transmutation it is shown to us how futile our nebulous approach of covering the existential angst inherent to our species actually is, of covering the daily unsettles, of continuously trying the concealment or the filling of a void that is pressed right there in the centre of the human being, trapped in the ceaseless spiral of tribulation, injunctions and paradoxical interrogations that life opens in front of us. From this perspective, the Fontanian spatial concept brings in the limelight the scissure of half life (the famous midlifecrisis) and mostly its acuteness that realizes that it cannot continue in the reiteration of the habitual axiological schemes of the young adult; such openness comes with the hope also, at least announced, of finding a beyond, more wide and profound which, even though it was always there, it suddenly appears in our mental horizon full of unexpected potentialities.

We are presented with a void – anguishing maybe – over and beyond which the mature individual eventually has to pass by to live, possibly through filing his own mental tableau or horizon with new matters, ideas or interesting and fascinating aspirations that act at least as the carrot in the fishing pole with which Louis de Funes, in La folie des grandeurs (1917) was deceiving the donkey he rode but which, wilfully, did not want to move forward. The adult remains, from the mental horizon’s point of view, at the level arrayed by a traditionalist painting which he hangs on the wall of an exhibition that becomes, surprisingly fast, the durable institution of a respected museum. The social gatherings (so necessary on this level) are nothing but strolls through picture galleries, comfortably lighted and warmed or chilled, depending on the case. Here, on these very walls and in these pictures lays all reality and all truth: everything is


on the open, we have no mystery and no wonder, reality intermingles with the truth (evidently ours). On the contrary, the process of maturation redoes or parallelizes, from our perspective, the history of art from around Impressionism and follows a continuous progression of thoroughness towards a Fontana or Klein. We can consider, in the continuation of our analysis, that everything that exists on a classic regular canvas are the members of a class, members between whom we can realize permutations, arrangements or various combinations; no matter what or how many operations we would make, we will only get other members or arrangements that, ultimately, belong to the same class. It is just the same in the case of the adult’s mental tableau: everything that appears there, that recombines or modifies, maybe adapts or changes, inexorably stays entangled in the same framework, the picture framed into the same frame, hung on the same wall without any possibility of auto-transcendence. However, the Fontanian découpages achieve their own auto-transcendence; they jump from the members of one class to the class per se which, precisely through this bold operation, they bring into discussion. The question raised addresses directly and without doubt to the analysis of pertinence of the spirit’s frame indeed, without limiting itself to the bare discussion about the elements of the painting (be it mental tableau); this time, the idea of painting itself is interrogated, respectively the basis, the horizon or the substratum of the mental, if we think about the subject of the current presentation. If we want an obvious analogy from media, we can talk about a specific way of “seeing” the TV. We generally watch what it is “on glass” without, not even for a moment, thinking that everything we see belongs to the superficial, relative and fleeting, images that come and go in a hurly, but which ask of us an involvement or a powerful participation mystique (as Lucien Lévy-Bruhl would say). But who ever tried to watch, at least as a Zen exercise, to the screen of the TV – a relatively easy thing to do if the TV is off, almost impossible if it is on? Something that could be easier, but with the same results would be the focusing and fixing of the glancing on the logo of the broadcasting TV program (regularly situated somewhere on the top right or left corner of the screen), as being the only item that does not move, modifies or changes throughout the whole broadcast – pure constancy, immutability by excellence, a piece of the absolute in an endless rush of relativities that unpredictable sweeps the same surface, base and support of the transformations. It is almost just like, “under” the idea of Heraclitus (the concept of permanent change – pantarhei), would lie a Parmenides at


lurch with his conception of continuance as a immutable sub-stratum that gives possibility or more so creates the frame of any move’s manifestation, a frame without which the always changing flow would not be possible. The call to the idea of Being comes here not only as a substance – irreducible base, respectively permanence versus transitivity – but also as a transcendence of a given, respectively of a real, that generously allows a leap beyond itself.

Of course, there could be interruptions, blockages or regressions wherever on the ongoing evolution of anybody, because rare are the ones who reach the epistemic fontana that bursts out of the hermeneutics of a Fontanian canvas. Ultimately, reality is a construction of our own mind, conventional and fortuitous, more or less happy, the only welcomed recipe of epistemological freeing from its monopolizing toils being the controlled madness (if we remember one of Don Juan’s notions, the main character of the Castanedian “adventure” novels) (Castaneda, 1990). In our case: I know it is wacky to paint a reflection of reality, something that would comprise at least a part of the world, but regardless, I can only create a picture even if it appear as a consequence of cutting and abusing the monochrome canvas – holding Zeigarnik still14– and with that I must be content. As never will I find the answers to the whole fathomless and unspeakable of the world, to the real considered as whole respectively. And then, like any other behaving adult that realizes the (auto)limitation, but not the limiting of his own existential being, I should only resort to actions crammed-full with non-actions, to doings that do not necessarily want to reap what they sow, to a rigorous control of madness respectively, because, as Don Juan stipulates, everything we humans do is, more or less, craziness; what a conscious individual can do in this case, comparing to the unconscious or semi-conscious ones, is to notice the gratuitousness of his own actions, their contingency in the great scheme of the universe respectively. It is also true that rare are those like Percival Bartlebooth (together with his paid helpers) from the La vie moded’emploie by Georges Perec, that stops over a fragment of reality – a marina – to

14 In the way that I stop questioning myself with questions I won’t find the answers

to, because I am no longer interested in the answers if the answers don’t come naturally, on their own (as revelations of the “internal voice”); as a consequence the curiosities are reduced to a minimum, acceptable and not at all uncomfortable, just like the thirst of clarifications also, and, from here, the drastic decrease of craving for conversation, debate and all the afferent socialization which we now it to be extremely time - and energy consuming.


paint it on paper (with watercolours) and which his helpers glue on a wood mainstay on which they draw the pieces of a puzzle which meticulously cut and wrap to expedite, years after, to the one who drew it whom recomposes the puzzle to make appear the watercolour landscape again and which, later on, another helper will wash off of any paint to finally remake the white paper – the original mainstay. As elaborated as perfect example of controlled madness, all the more so as all this shebang would fill the main character’s life.

Possible enlargements of the discussion frame Of course, there could be objected, rightfully so, why we do not

comment on other visual arts’ prominent movements of the past century, such as: Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, Minimalism or Hyperrealism etc. These being so characteristically American, they focus either on a “display window” direction (the Brillo soups of A. Warhol) or on a cautionless direction of booming emotions à la J Pollock, until the minimalist minimum, that is, in every work of art so little and insignificant that manage to impress only through the colossal size of the objects. Hyperrealism is presented with similar vulnerabilities, with its “perfect” superficiality of the image duplicated till the smallest details of the hair strands that make one think of Dürenian compulsion, but this time enlarged to a wall-sized dimension. It could also be affirmed that these American movements go from one extreme to another if we group them into contraries: from the breakouts or purely emotional explosions of Abstract Expressionism (Pollock, de Kooning) to the rigor situated at the antipodes of the ultra-geometric rational, filtered of any feeling of minimalism (Judd, Stella) or the minuteness of hyperrealism works that manically depict the smallest and most insignificant details (hair strands, skin pores etc). On an evolutional scale of the human spirit, such artistic manifestations do not necessarily come with something revealing; all things considered, they are close illustrations of consumerism society arrived and sustained, more or less, artificially to its apparently-timeless peak.

Much more relevant, if we were to give examples from contemporary art, would be the work of Gerhard Richter, with his portraits or human figures that are seen somewhat in a fog, totally defocused. In front of such a painting, the viewer sees and does not see very clearly a human individual that is there, in the painting, and so, present, but who you cannot “grasp” or com-prehend too easily because he is missing his clear and smooth outlines that would detach him from the background; he is in some way one with the background, emergent at limit, like being born


from the background only to (re)disappear again. Richter, through these paintings, manages to invite us to the detachment from the object, respectively to the detachment of what the eyes acutely see, to the putting into perspective the visual information that travels to the brain to be processed. The data of the senses is, in other words, misleading…and we can detach from the objective concrete character to explore the transcendent dimensions of the vague. When the perception is put into perspective, it means that the attachment to the world, together with its concrete beings and objects, is being transposed on the area of what seems to be detachment, segregation or differentiation towards more elevated regions, at least on a Maslowian pyramid (Maslow, 2007). Also relevant in the spirit of our discussion could be those découpage – cut-out – made by a “later” Tom Wesselmann (past his middle age), where we only have the demarcation lines of a nude, interior or landscape, made from metal (black and white at first, later coloured) to be put on a wall. Just like in the works of Fontana, through these clippings, just outlines of some objects filtered of any substance, put on the wall, we viewers do not know exactly what are we watching. Is it the wall that makes the “substance” of an object (eminently illusory) or is it the outline that, through its void demarcates and suggests the possibility of an object (that does not actually exist and which is deprived of any substance)? A fertile dialogue, opened toward the usually perceived real and how easily we can let ourselves be engaged in perceiving a reality that exists, for our senses, only as a suggestion. Anish Kappor’s works also bring an interesting existential meditation, which, through their colossal size, invite the spectator to the inspection of inside of the said object. We refer here to his Leviathan, exposed in Grande Palais, Paris, 2011, so big that the visitors, the spectators respectively could enter it. We have here, the art object that swallows us, which we can live-in to meditate about the world and existence from the inside of the art work that becomes both our surrounding space and our entire mental horizon. The art object, by excellence a Popper’s 3rd world object grew so much that infested the first world – the one of the natural physical objects, the replacement of physic reality of what we know.

Conclusions Entering a more concrete and illustrative register, we can ascertain

that the mental tableau of an individual can become obvious, most suddenly and unexpectedly; for example: you can here at the pool, where


it isn’t so?, people must take photos in the swimming pool as well, the phrase: “I can’t take photo because neon!”. We discuss here not only the colloquial language or the candour with which it is talked in this way, but the fact that you must belong to a certain environment and situate yourself on a certain intellectual-cultural station of development to ”afford” such surprising and also shocking verbal emanations. This particular mental tableau, and I am referring here to its intimate and characteristic nature, is by excellence, superficial, hollow, rudimentary and ridiculously simply structured, resembling a plangent cymbal. Superficial because it mandatory involves much talking and much less thinking, the correlation between the two being so frighteningly thin. Hollow because it is overfilled with gaps generally cultural, but also linguistic, psychological or philosophical which are also, covered with a verbosity full of insolence, but extremely voluble. Rudimentary because it has numerous aspects, areas or files that are kept unaltered since childhood, handed down from father to son and from mother to daughter so to speak; for example: “If the owl sings, somebody dies.” (this being said by an adult, with kids and a family) or, at the countryside where “The bread isn’t thrown away because it is a sin in front of God.”, and, around the same area and register: “The wheat is sacred because on its grain the Virgin Mary’s face can be seen.”. Of course that the array of examples could continue with expressions consecrated by the extrovert psychological slope of the much general “But what will the world say if…” or with others from resembling areas situated on the same levels of the mental tableaus, but once we got the idea, the citations are no longer necessary, no matter how sparkly they are.

So if we were to conclude, we will do so with another illustration: the mental tableau of somebody becomes “visible” through the projections that are made on the internal screen, projections on which the individual self assists just like in a movie theatre (just as absorbed, just as fascinated and lost in the projection as it is lost to the world). And so, the self attends a movie, he is or lets himself be immersed in a show that comprises the individual in a conqueror, absorbing, contaminating kind of way. But this “movie” can browse a very large spectrum of possibilities of verbiage, more or less artistic, depending on the level or spectrum of the development of the individual’s preferences. For instance, the projections on the internal screen can be in the form of old movies, in black and white and with a scratched film, 60’s movies with a simplistic ethic in black and white, heroes caught between the eternal dichotomy of good and bad,


movies about sport, homicides, chasings, accidents, most coloured soap operas from Hollywood or Bollywood, but also news and games, contests or entertainment. Clearly, the projections can also have, as a gravitation centre, areas more sophisticated, such as opera, theatre, postmodernist type films, scientific or informative programs. All this spectrum of possibilities is nominative, potentially speaking, without the apparition of any obligation, in a way or another, for the individual himself as he is. Everybody gets to a certain set or slice of “favourite programmes” which, the more they are visited, the more will the attachment and addiction to them grow, just like the encirclement, respectively the comprising or inherent immersion of any routine (fed and then sustained with its own inertia). In other words, we have here the limitation or narrowing of the mental tableau, with the consequence that the freedom of the individual will be constricted or reduced to a very well-known slice, no matter his level. We see here the intervention of a circularity in a “closed circle” that self-sustains and self-perpetuates especially after it has lost (by its own inertial fixation) the contact with the innovative and provocative effluvium of the great world. The circularity, in its own redundancy, always scans the same floors; the favourite show feeds the tastes that limit themselves to the favourite show, and so fixating the general frame of an individual mental tableau which is exposed close to other (just as individual) mental tableaus on the same thematic wall of socializations. In such context, we can imagine what kind of mental pictures are formed by TV programmes such as Antena 1 or 3, Romania TV for news/actualities respectively or Antena Stars for entertainment and novelties of national showbiz world. In about the same context we could situate the ones for whom the culture reaches its superior limit through the famous British gutter press or through the oh, so loved Heftromans15 in the Germanic space. All these programmes and publications flocked together with their public success accurately and without any hermeneutical make-up indicates the cultural-intellectual level on which a great part of the population, regardless of geographic location, economical or

15 Heftroman or Romanheft is a cheap romance novel (literally and figuratively

speaking) that appears at two German publishers with approximately 30-40 titles per week. Published for decades and with constant and consistent, even in the third millennium, success this literature edulcorated by indelible pink shades of the covers and characters appeared, satisfies the need of compensatory dreams of a common, grim reality, with lack of “adrenaline” coupled on the basis of some feelings eroded by dissatisfaction and corroded by consumerism.


technological level of the origin country, is situated. These are nothing but axiological patterns that first deposited and with the passing of time imposed, and which have caught the population’s attention in the most irreversible way. True “guiding lights”, these emanations emitted without much effort, but with an irresistible power of attraction, have fascinated generations of followers, seated comfortably in their armchairs or lolled on their extensible couches to ingurgitate afternoon after afternoon, night after night respectively, the same variations on a given subject without ever stopping to look, at least epistemologically, beyond the flatness of the screen or to read, slightly hermeneutically, between the lines. Everything happens as if there would not exist a red stop button, as if the individual would not have any other option but the addiction and the general giving into the hands of the mass-media, political, sports or consumerism propaganda. The frame of the individual’s mental tableau seems to be suited to the unconfined and misguided reception of everything that comes in his size, the same as the latter seems to be tuned exactly on the needs and tastes of the passive receiver - the perfect congruency of a match made in heaven.

We anticipate, after these exemplifications and mini-analysis that the mental tableau, that for that matter eludes any soteriology, is the intricate result of the collaboration between the individual and external influences, respectively between the personal sphere and the social one communicational intermediated. The relationship between the subject and the world (be it the mass-media’s) is a bi-univocal one that goes towards osmosis so intertwined and profound in their complexity that it is impossible to distinguish, even at a closer look, what is personal and what is collective, which is the demand and which is the supply respectively. The two seem to be melting in a sole deontological conglomerate that finds itself functioning by its own inertia that affords to not take into account other perturbation factors of a value system refolded on itself. An enclosed world, comprised in its own enmeshing foam that recreates endlessly to constitute “a paradoxical inward in which the great part of the adjacent co-bubbles are at the same time neighbours and outside contact, linked and distant from the point I occupy” (Sloterdijk, 2005, p.49). Thus comes also the modesty of the hermeneutics that sees itself isolated and caught in a closed circle without permitting the possibility of fertilized revitalizations. The mental tableaus, varnished, framed and exposed in the personal museum, challenges any epistemic touch, they sit and reign majestically over their own auto-sufficiency, impassive and


fixed in the psychical space of an “almost-conscious” ascribed to an unforgettable subliminal of unquestioned collective nature.

REFERENCES Castaneda, C., (1990), A Separate Reality, Arkana: Penguin Books. Damasio, A.R., (2004), Descartes’ Error (Eroarea lui Descartes),

Bucharest: Humanitas Publishing House. Fromm, E., (1976), To Have or to Be?, New York: Harper & Row,

Publishers. Gozo, Z., (2009), An Insight into Adult Education (O incursiune în

educaţia adulţilor), Timişoara: ArtPress and Augusta Publishing House. Gozo, Z., (2013), The Modern Man between Existence and Possession, în

Philobiblon – Transylvanian Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Humanities, Vol. XVIII (2013), No. 2, July – December 2013.

Gozo, Z., (2015), INTERIORITY AND EXTERIORITY searching for self, înPhilobiblon – Transylvanian Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Humanities, Vol. XX (2015), No. 2, July – December 2015.

Jung, C.G., (1997), Psychological Types (Tipuri psihologice), Bucharest: Humanitas Publishing House.

Jung, C.G., (2003), Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (Arhetipurile şi inconştientul colectiv), in Complete Works, 1, Bucharest: Trei Publishing House.

Maslow, A.H., (2007), Motivation and Personality (Motivaţie şi personalitate), Bucharest: Trei Publishing House.

Popper, K.R., (1997), Knowledge and the Body-Mind Relationship (Cunoaşterea şi problema raportului corp-minte), Odorheiu Secuiesc: Trei Publishing House.

Rank, O., (1950), Psychology and the Soul, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Sloterdijk, P., (2005), Sphères III, Paris: Maren Sell Éditeurs. Zeigarnik, B., (1927), Das Behalten erledigter und unerledigter

Handlungen, Psychologische Forschung, 9.


THE REASON WHY STUDENTS CHOOSE COMMUNICATION AND PUBLIC RELATIONS

FACULTIES

ILARION ŢIU [email protected]

Abstract: Our research analyses students’ motivation when choosing a

Communication and Public Relations faculty, as well as their expectations with regard to this bachelor’s degree specialisation. Our analysis is based on questionnaires used in two Bucharest universities – the National School of Political and Administrative Studies (public university) and the “Dimitrie Cantemir” Christian University (private university). As many as one hundred respondents were included in the research, all first-year students, 50 from each university. Our study shows that there is a lack of communication between the universities and their potential candidates, phenomenon which may generate first-year students’ dissatisfaction with the faculties, bearing direct consequences on university abandonment/dropout. Another important component of our research refers to the growing role of the internet in high school graduates’ information about university curricula. Consequently, universities should restructure their marketing strategy and adapt themselves to the young people’s mass communication style.

Keywords: Bachelor degree, Faculties of Communication and Public

Relations, expectations of students at faculties, university dropout, labor market. 1. Introduction This research analyses students’ motivation when choosing a

Communication and Public Relations faculty, as well as their expectations with regard to this bachelor’s degree specialisation. Given the fact that enrolment in the first year has dropped dramatically in recent years, we will try to estimate the strategies for retaining this speciality in the portfolio of the Romanian universities.

Our study focuses on four research questions: 1. Which are the baccalaureate graduates’ reasons when choosing Communication Sciences

Associate Professor, Faculty of Political Science, Communication and Public

Relations Department, “Dimitrie Cantemir” Christian University, Bucharest.


as Bachelor’s degree specialisation; 2. Which are the channels helping the baccalaureate graduates to get informed about the offer of the Communication and Public Relations faculties (or of other faculties having Communication Sciences as Bachelor’s degree specialisation); 3. What are the expectations of the first-year students of a Communication and Public Relations faculty; 4. How do the first-year students of a Communication and Public Relations faculty picture themselves professionally after graduation.

The study is divided into seven sections, starting with this introduction. Section two presents several surveys on the status of Romanian higher education system. Section three briefly deals with Communication Sciences as Bachelor’s degree specialisation. Section four describes the working methodology based on which the research was conducted. Section five presents the results obtained following the employment of the research instruments and data processing. Section six dwells on the limitations of our research while the last section presents the conclusions of the research and our recommendations.

2. Higher education status in official figures In order to place our research in the general context of Romanian

higher education, we studied a number of reports prepared by the Ministry of Education1 or by its subordinate institutions. Here are significant aspects – related to the theme of our research – regarding higher education in Romania.

The number of universities has increased progressively since the fall of the communist regime. While in the first years there were only public universities located mainly in the big cities, over 100 higher learning institutions developed in the meantime with both budget and private financing. Over 2009-2011, the national university system had the following configuration2:

1 We shall use the name of Ministry of Education since this institution bore several

names during the period studied in thissection. 2 Ministry of Education, Raport privind starea învățământului superior în România –

2015 (Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015), 5 September, 2016, https://www.edu.ro/raport-privind-starea-%C3%AEnv%C4%83%C8%9B%C4%83m%C3%A2ntului-superior-%C3%AEn-rom%C3%A2nia-2015 (accessed on 26 November 2016). The data used were provided by the National Institute of Statistics (henceforth called INS).


Table 1. The number of universities (accredited and provisional authorized) in Romania, 2009-2015

2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013 2013/2014 2014/2015 108 108 107 103 101 101

Public property 56 56 56 55 55 55 Private property

52 52 52 52 48 46

Source: Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015, p. 4

We notice that one public university was closed during the

researched period, accounting for 1.8%, while private universities registered six losses, representing 11.53%. The fact should be mentioned that the 2009/2010 academic year marked the beginning of the decline of the Romanian higher education from the point of view of enrolled students. The phenomenon was caused by several factors. On the one hand, enrolling in faculties were the young ones born after 1990, when natality rate decreased. On the other hand, the number of the years of studies for a bachelor’s degree diminished, following the introduction of the “Bologna Process”. After 2010, the economic crisis affected the students paying tuition fees in the both public and private system. Last but not least, the number of baccalaureate graduates dropped significantly, a phenomenon caused by school abandonment and the higher baccalaureate examexigences (starting 2011)3.

An analysis of the number of accredited, or temporarily accredited, faculties reveals even better the higher education crisis, which has affected mostly the private universities:

Table 2. Number faculties (accredited and provisionally authorized) who worked

in universities in Romania in 2009-2015 2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013 2013/2014 2014/2015

The number of faculties (accredited and

624 629 614 596 590 583

3 National Council for Higher Education Financing, Raport public anual – 2014

(Annual Public Report – 2014). Starea finanțării învățământului superior şi măsurile de optimizare ce se impun (State of Higher Education Financing and the required optimisation measures), 15 June 2015,http://www.cnfis.ro/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/CNFIS-Raport-public2014_final.pdf (accessed on 26 November 2016).


provisionally authorized) Faculties in public universities

417 422 410 405 405 403

Faculties in private universities

207 207 204 191 185 180


Therefore, during the period subject to research, the number of public

faculties shrank by 3.35%, while that of private faculties regressed significantly, by 13.04%. In the years to come, the number of private faculties will decrease even further since the private universities have initiated the liquidation procedure for a number of specialisations (the faculties will close when the last enrolled class ends the bachelor’s degree cycle).

Private faculties have several vulnerable areas. First of all, problems are caused by the financing system, exclusively based on students’ fees. The same difficulty is encountered by some of the public universities, especially in small towns, where the number of fee paying students decreased substantially. For the time being, the crisis is not felt too strongly. On the other hand, the private universities cannot cope with competition due to their limited number of specialisations. From a numerical point of view, the ratio is balanced, with 48.14% private universities in 2009, and 45.54% in 2015. Still, private higher education is underrepresented in point of number, with 33.17% in 2009, and 30.84% in 2015. Territorial distribution is another disadvantage. More than half of private universities, 55% respectively, operate in the Bucharest-Ilfov area, as to 26% of public universities4. Competition for a limited demographic areal generates significant disadvantages to private higher education.

The number of first-year students (bachelor’s degree cycle) is another

important factor for our research. According to the data supplied by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), the situation is a follows:

4 Raport privind starea învățământului superior în România – 2015 (Report on the status

of higher education in Romania – 2015), p. 15-16.


Table 3. Number of students enrolled in the first year (bachelor) in universities in Romania (public and private) in 2011-2014

2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013 2013/2014 2014/2015

Number of students

Total 775.319 673.001 539.852 464.592 433.234 411.229

Public 452.982 433.063 399.464 364.916 353.988 345.336

Private 322.337 239.938 140.388 99.676 79.246 65.893

By ownership share

Total (%) 100 100 100 100 100 100

Public (%) 58,4 64,3 74,0 78,5 81,7 84

Private (%) 41,6 35,7 26,0 21,5 18,3 16


One can note the descending trend of first-year enrolment, the

studied period registering a 46.96% decrease. Private universities were mostly affected as they registered a 79.55% drop in first-year enrolment. In only six years, private higher education became a minority as to the public one, the percentage of first-year students collapsing from 41% in 2009 to 16% in 2014.

The direct consequence of this phenomenon is the population’s limited access to higher learning. Calculations regarding the enrolment gross rate5 show that less than one third of the Romanian young people attends university courses6.

Table 4. Gross enrollment rate in higher education to young people aged 19-23

years 2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012 2012/2013 2013/2014 2014/2015

Total (%) 45 40,8 28,4 26,5 30 31,1 Female (%) 50,7 45,7 31,9 29,8 32,8 34 Male (%) 39,5 36,2 25,1 23,3 27,3 28,4


5 Gross rate represents the percentage of students enrolled in a higher education

form, as against the entire population, by age segments. 6 Raport privind stareaînvățământului superior în România – 2015 (Report on the status

of higher education in Romania – 2015), p. 21.


Therefore, over six years, the gross rate of 19-23 year old enrolment in higher learning institutions decreased by 15%. Among causes we suggest school dropout, higher rate of high school graduates that fail to pass the baccalaureate tests, as well as the after 2010 economic crisis, which limited young people’s access to fee-based higher learning institutions (public or private). The regression of enrolled student gross rate was also influenced by the fact that baccalaureate graduates left to study abroad. The number of Romanian students in European Union universities grew by 42.87% over 2008-2012 (Eurostat, 2015)7.

Table 5. Number of students registered in the Romanian universities in the

European Union in 2008-2012 2008 209 2010 2011 2012

Number 21.267 25.072 28.587 29.159 37.228 Source: Annual Public Report – 2014. State of Higher Education

Financing and the required optimisation measures, p. 20 Our universities, public and private, failed to provide a higher

education sustainable development. Romania holds the last but one place in the European Union (EU-28) in point of higher learning graduates8, with a rate of 19.6% (Ireland is first with 46.8%)9.

Probably, the causes are in the underfinanced education system. Even if public universities emerged in other than the well-known centres after 1990, the number of budget subsidised places was limited, which blocked the access of an ever larger number of high school graduates to higher education. Public universities provided the tuition fee alternative, but the amounts were rather high. On the other hand, although they charged lower fees, private universities developed only in several centres, mostly in the Bucharest-Ilfov area (55%). Consequently, private universities failed to benefit from the potential pool of high school graduates not

7 Ibidem, p. 20. 8 Eurostat data calculates the number of graduates, which is by far smaller than that

of the first-year students. 9 Eurostat, Educational attainment statistics, June 2016, http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-

explained/index.php/Educational_attainment_statistics (accessed on 29 November 2016).


enrolled in public higher learning institutions at national level10. Besides the decline in university first-year enrolment, the Romanian

higher education is also confronted with a very high abandonment rate. An analysis of the ratio between the number of first-year students and the number of graduates reveals the scope of this phenomenon.

Table 6. Number of graduates (bachelor) of Romanian universities (public and

private) in 2010-2014 2010/2011 2012/2013 2013/2014

Number of graduates

186.900 111.028 95.022

Source: Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labor market, p. 3; Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015, p. 22-23.

One may note a 49.15% drop in the number of graduates in the

2013/2014 academic year as compared to the 2010-2011 academic year11. But it is not this particular calculation that gives the real image of the decline in the number of university graduates. A comparison of the number of first-year students in the 2011/2012 academic year with the number of the 2013/2014 academic year graduates evinces that 95,022 of 539.852 students finished their years of studies12. Therefore, the higher learning graduation rate is 17.30%, which translates into a university abandonment rate of 82.39%!13

The analysis of student distribution by genre indicator shows some of

10 Raport public anual – 2014 (Annual Public Report – 2014). Starea finanțării învățământului superior și măsurile de optimizare ce se impun (State of Higher Education Financing and the required optimisation measures), p. 15-16.

11 Executive Unit for the Financing of Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation (UEFISCDI), Raportul studiului de monitorizare a inserției pe piața muncii a absolvenților – promoțiile 2010 și 2014 (Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labour market), http://sapm.forhe.ro/rezultate (accessed on 30 November 2016); Raport privind starea învățământului superior în România – 2015 (Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015), p. 22-23.

12 See Table 3. 13 Figures are subject to corrections as we referred to a three-year bachelor’s degree

cycle, in keeping with the Bologna Process. There are faculties where the bachelor’s degree years of studies exceed this limit, therefore the students enrolled in 2011 did not graduate in 2014. We estimate that the dropout rate was higher because the graduates that studied more than three years were enrolled in faculties with classes whose enrolments exceeded the 2011 level.


the dysfunctions of the Romanian higher education system. Table 7. Distribution of students from universities in Romania (public and

private), by gender Gen 2010/2011 2012/2013 2013/2014

Female 112.260 60,06% 64.143 57,8% 54.506 57,4% Male 74.640 39.93% 46.885 42,2% 40.516 42,6%

Source: Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labor market, p. 3; Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015, p. 22.

Thus, the number of women who complete their years of studies is by

approximately 20% larger than that of men. In certain domains, the number of women graduates is even higher, which will create genre-basedmisbalances in the qualified labour force.

Last but not least, bachelor’s degree specialisations chosen by baccalaureate graduates are also of interest. During the communist period, higher education was synchronised with the needs of the centralised economy, developed being the technical, engineering and industrial faculties, to the detriment of social, economic and legal specialisations. The first years after 1990 witnessed the boom of faculties less developed in the past, especially legal and economic ones14.

In the 2014/2015 academic year, in keeping the data supplied by INS15, the enrolment in the bachelor’s degree years of studies was as follows:

Table 8. Number of students enrolled in undergraduate university education

(public and private) in the academic year 2014/2015 (T=411.229)

Specialization Bachelor

(C1)

Total Students

(public and private)

(C2)

% (C3)

Public universities

Private universities

Total public (C4)

% (C5)

Total private

(C6)

% (C7)

Education sciences

10.809 2,63 9.393 86,90 1.416 13,10

14 Raport public anual – 2014 (Annual Public Report – 2014). Starea finanțării

învățământului superior și măsurile de optimizare ce se impugn (State of Higher Education Financing and the required optimisation measures), p. 20.

15 Raport privind starea învățământului superior în România – 2015 (Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015), p. 15-16.


Arts and sciences humanities

35.079 8,53 32.319 92,13 2.760 7,87

Social sciences, journalism and information

30.993 7,54 22.751 73,41 8.242 26,59

Business, Directors and Justice

104.416 25,39 65.862 63,08 38.554 36,92

Natural Sciences, mathematics and statistics

19.632 4,77 18.387 93,66 1.245 6,34

Technologies information and communication (ICT)

27.034 6,57 24.587 90,95 2.447 9,05

Engineering, processing and construction

86.463 21,03 83.544 96,62 2.919 3,38

Agriculture, forestry, fishery and veterinary science

21.134 5,14 20.717 98,03 417 1,97

Health and social assistance

60.985 14,83 55.383 90,81 5.602 9,19

Services 14.684 3,57 12.393 84,40 2.291 15,60

Source: Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015, p. 15-16

Several misbalances can be noted, especially in the development of

private higher education as against that of the public one (columns C5 and C7). The faculties operating within the private universities are actually competitive only in the fields of business, administration and law, and, rather timidly in social sciences, journalism and information. The private higher education developed only to a small extent the technical or medical faculties. A possible cause could be the investments such specialisations need, which the private universities could not cover only from the students’ funds.

3. Bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication and Public

Relations According to the lists of specialisations/curricula for the 2016/2017

academic year, the bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication


and Public Relations is part of the fundamental field of Social Sciences, the Communication Sciences branch, bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication Sciences16.

The Communication Sciences branch was introduced in the Romanian higher learning institutions after 1990, and the first relevant faculty was developed with foreign assistance. In 1991, the Faculty of Journalism of the Bucharest University signed a co-operation protocol with the Faculty of Communication of the UQAM University Quebec Montreal (Montreal, Canada). First, Canadian professors came to Bucharest to train Romanian colleagues, and in the 1992/1993 academic year, the Faculty of Journalism of the University Bucharest hosted the first courses on public relations. In the following academic year, 1993/1994, the Faculty of Journalism of the University of Bucharest was renamed Faculty of Journalism and Communication Sciences (FJSC). The Public Communication Section of FSJC went through an assessment procedure in the 1997/1998 academic year, when it was temporarily accredited by the National Council for Academic Evaluation and Accreditation (CNEAA). Starting 2000, the Romanian universities began organising doctor’s degree studies on Communication Sciences17.

Bachelor’s degree studies on Communication Sciences were organised in 54 faculties in the 2016/2017 academic year. Public universities provided bachelor’s degree studies in Communication Science in 40 faculties while private universities organised similar courses in 14 faculties18. The Communication and Public Relations specialisation was provided by 25 faculties, 16 public and 9 private19.

16 Registrul Național Integrat (National Integrated Register), Nomenclatoarele domeniilor

și specializărilor/ programelor de studii universitare2016-2017 (Lists of university domains and specialisations/curricula for 2016/2017.

https://www.rei.gov.ro/index.php?&c=31&ddpN=1603056339&we=064a0196806f1159ce5df19dc5369c58&wf=dGFCall&wtok=419edb55fb90d2a28610ba7a012bf61954ec46d9&wtkps=FcrNDYAgDEDhXTpB+WmFsoM7VISE6A0TDsbdhdtL3qfi5O1CAuO57g6piYscyaQ+D/R2wiorkA0X9QdqzkgYat08UeBgWasyuuUmGwXSnr4f&wchk=659951a9ad23d3734cd0186e59c583cefc00f9de (accessed on 1 December 2016).

17 Information provided by university professor Marian Petcu, PhD, of the Faculty of Journalism and Communication Sciences of the Bucharest University, to whom I am grateful.

18 Optiuni.ro, Programe de licență (Bachelor), ttp://optiuni.ro/search/?programType=license&supraDomains=11,10&domains=

35 (accessed on 3 December 2016). 19 Optiuni.ro, Programe de licență (Bachelor),


The identified statistics do not offer an image as regards the number of first-year students who chose Communication Sciences as bachelor’s degree specialisation. However, an analysis can be made at national level of the faculties (specialisations20) related to this domain. The fact that the Romanian universities organised bachelor’s degree specialisation entrance exams for 2,061 candidates21 in the 2016/2017 academic year shows that Communication Sciences studies account for 2.62% of the potential options at national level. Communication and Public Relations specialisation account for even less, 1.21% respectively.

4. Methodology Our research on the reasons why students choose a Communication

and Public Relations faculty and their expectations with regard to this bachelor’s degree specialisation was made on a questionnaire-based analysis. This research instrument had four closed questions (the first with one answer, the following with multiple choice answers) and five questions that collected respondents’ socio-demographic data.

The questionnaire was applied to 100 students of the Faculty of Communication and Public Relations – National School of Political and Administrative Studies (public university, henceforth called SNSPA–CRP) and the Faculty of Political Sciences, Communication and Public Relations specialisation– “Dimitrie Cantemir” Christian University (private university, henceforth called UCDC–CRP). As many as 50 first-year students, bachelor’s degree cycle, from each university were included in this research. One public and one private university were chosen to test whether there are differences between the students’ reasons in choosing a university based on the financing criterion (the faculty of the public university also has fee financed places).

The research covered the 3-7 October, 2016 period, the first week of the 2016/2017 academic year. We distributed the paper-based questionnaires first thing in the morning, during the first course of the

http://optiuni.ro/search/?programType=license&supraDomains=11&domains=35

&specializations=102 (accessed on 3 December 2016). 20 A specialisation related to the bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication

Sciences can function in a faculty with another specialisation. For example at the “Dimitrie Cantemir” Christian University the accredited bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication and Public Relations function with the Faculty of Political Sciences.

21 Optiuni.ro, Programe de licență (Bachelor), ttp://optiuni.ro/search/?programType=license (accessed on 3 December 2016).


students included in this research in order to collect information about their reasons and expectations from the faculty before getting actually engaged in the academic curriculum.

The subjects were 18-to-25 years old belonging to the age group expected to get enrolled in a university, in keeping with official statistical criteria (see Table 4).

Table 9. Age of students included in research

Age (years) Total (%) SNSPA–CRP (%) UCDC–CRP (%) 18 23 24 22 19 52 62 42 20 18 12 24 21 4 2 6 24 2 4 25 1 2

One may note that the UCDC-CRP students exceed to a larger extent

the average age of enrolment in the first year (19, see Table 4). The fact that they did not enrol in the faculty the year they passed the baccalaureate exam, or that they failed to pass the baccalaureate exam the year they graduated from high school could be a possible explanation. We did not collect information on the period when the baccalaureate exam was held. Since this criterion can be relevant for our study, in a subsequent stage of our research, we will introduce a question meant to collect data on the period when the respondents passed the baccalaureate exam.

The students included in this research are mostly girls (74%). As Table 7 shows, the student population of Romania is preponderantly feminine, respectively 60.06%. By tradition, this figure is even higher in the social and humanities faculties. Therefore, we can explain why our study includes 14% more female respondents than the country average.

The questionnaire we used also referred to the regions (historical not development-related) wherefrom the respondents come.


Table 10. Historical regions where they come from students enrolled in research

Region Total (%) SNSPA–CRP

(%) UCDC–CRP

(%) Bucharest 49 36 62 Muntenia 21 16 26 Dobrogea 4 8 0 Moldavia 15 22 8 Oltenia 7 12 2 Transylvania 1 2 0 Banat 1 0 2 Republic of Moldova 2 4 0

There are significant differences between the possibilities of the

aforementioned two faculties to enrol students from regions outside the university centre. UCDC–CRP, faculty operating within a private university, recruits its students mostly from Bucharest and neighbouring counties (historical region called Wallachia). The faculty follows the tendency of the private universities to enrol students from the capital city, as discussed in subchapter 2 of the present study. SNSPA–CRP, besides the pool of students from Bucharest (majority), enrolled high school graduates from almost all historical regions (including the Republic of Moldova), priority having Wallachia, Moldavia and Oltenia.

Last but not least, the profile of the high schools the students included in the research graduated from was also of interest.

Table 11. Profile of graduating high school students enrolled in research

School profile Total (%) SNSPA–CRP

(%) UCDC–CRP

(%) Natural Sciences 6 4 8 Math and Computer science 7 6 8 Economic 7 4 10 Social Sciences 26 20 32 Philology 51 60 42 Vocational 3 6 0

Most of the students included in the research graduated from

philology or social sciences high schools. Therefore, we have a group of young people with a social and humanities education that corresponds to the scientific profile of the bachelor’s degree specialisation in Communication Sciences. However, there are several differences. Most of


the students enrolled in SNSPA–CRP come from philology high schools, while their colleagues at UCDC–CRP graduated, to a larger extent, from social sciences high schools. What differentiatesthe UCDC–CRP students is the fact they are graduates of economic high schools in a percentage significantly higher than that at SNSPA–CRP.

5. Results The data collected during this research were processed with the help

of the SPSS application. To question no. 1, Why have you chosen this faculty? (just one answer),

most respondents (N=100), 47% respectively, answered I think I have the necessary skills.

Table 12. Students answer to question included in the survey. 1: Why have you chosen this faculty?

Total (%)

SNSPA–CRP(%)

UCDC–CRP(%)

I believe that skills in field 47 62 32 It provides a competitive graduate labor market

14 12 16

On the recommendation of family 4 2 6 At the recommendation of friends 4 6 2 It is a field of study accessible 20 12 28 Out of curiosity 4 4 4 It's close to home 0 0 0 I have no reason, I wanted to make a college

3 2 4

Another reason 3 0 6 DK / NR 1 0 2

One can notice that this first answer is the dominant reason for the

students of both faculties22, although there are different percentages – 62% for SNSPA–CRP, and 32% respectively for UCDC–CRP. Although the percentage of the UCDC–CRP students is lower for this I think I have the necessary skills variant, it remains dominant as against the other options (see the last column in Table 12).

22 We shall use the term faculties in this subchapter for the fluency of the

presentation, although, in the case of UCDC–CRP there is a specialisation in Communication and Public Relations, which functions within the Faculty of Political Sciences.


We would like to stress again that this question had only one answer variant because we wanted to find out the dominant reason that made the students included in this research to enroll in a Communication and Public Relations faculty. On the one hand, this answer is a positive signal as we assume that the first-year students will be interested in studying, considering that this specialisation represents them. On the other hand, there is also the possibility of desirable answers, as they try to justify their option.

As a secondary reason of the students included in this research we have the variant It is an accessible domain, selected by 20% of the respondents. There is a noticeable predisposition of the UCDC–CRP students for this option. As far as they are concerned, this answer is relatively close to the aforementioned one, respectively I think I have the necessary skills. Therefore, the reason for choosing a Communication and Public Relations faculty oscillates between the impression that they have the skills for a career in communication and the fact that this specialisation is more accessible.

We presume that such a line of reasoning can lead to a higher university dropout, once the students notice that this field is not as accessible as they expected. In order to check whether our hypothesis is correct, we will have to perform another study in the 2018/2019 academic year, when we have data regarding the abandonment rate at the two faculties included in this research.

A third reason to choose the faculty, in point of answer frequency, is It provides a diploma competitive on the labour market. As much as 14% of respondents ticked off this option. The fact is worth mentioning that the UCDC–CRP students have stronger beliefs with regard to the quality of the diploma obtained.

The pessimism of the respondents as regards the opportunities offered by a bachelor’s degree diploma in Communication and Public Relations to find a job is supported by specialised research. The Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labour market (Raportul studiului de monitorizare a inserției pe piața muncii a absolvenților – promoțiile 2010 și 2014), prepared by the Executive Unit for the Financing of Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation (UEFISCDI), shows that the graduates of the social sciences faculties believe that their specialisation helped them find a jobfor only 24.6%, while their own personality and personal skill of establishing a


relationship were by far more useful – 32,9%23. The other answers to question no. 1 scored less than 5% and cannot

provide significant information about students’ reasons when choosing a Communication and Public Relations faculty. Had more answers to this questionbeen allowed the role of the family would have been more relevant, given the fact that the students are 19-25 years old and, most probably, not independent economically.

To question no. 2How have you found out about the offer of this faculty? (multiple choice question), most of the respondents (N=100), that is 60%, answered they searched on the internet.

Table 13. Students answer to question included in the survey. 2: How have

you found out about the offer of this faculty?

Total (%)

SNSPA–CRP(%)

UCDC–CRP(%)

From family / friends 48 42 54 I was visited by teachers of faculty / university high school

7 0 14

After a visit to the college / university Otherwise School Week

13 14 12

I received promotional materials on the street

3 0 6

We got out of the promotional materials at the Baccalaureate exam

9 0 18

I saw the university's promotional ads display street / monitors in subway

4 0 8

I've searched on internet 60 76 44 I saw an ad on Facebook 6,0 8 4 From another source 4 6 2

There are differences between the two groups of respondents. The

majority percentage for this answer was set by the SNSPA–CRP students, 76%, who searched the offer of the faculty on the internet, while their UCDC–CRP colleagues found out about it from their families/friends.

Worth mentioning is the candidates’ tendency to search online information about the faculties they want to attend. It is much easier for

23 Raportul studiului de monitorizare a inserției pe piațamuncii a absolvenților – promoțiile

2010 și 2014, (Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labour market) p. 52-53.


their generation to resort to this source as they have access to the internet using more devices than the young people in the past, priority having the smartphones.

This result can be a sign for universities as well, as they can restructure their future online promotion strategies. The ads and products posted on the internet are much cheaper than printed ads, they have no distribution and transport restrictions and can be accessed from anywhere. An online promotion strategy can be useful for the faculties that intend to attract students from regions other than the university centre.

The preferences for the internet of the students included in the research refer mostly to search engines (ex. Google), or to links posted on other sites accessed by the candidates. Only 6% of the respondents identified social networks (Facebook) as the source that made them enrol. One may presume that there is a confusion/overlap of terms between the Internet and Facebook answers. It is highly probable that there was no confusion and that the candidates actually search on Google using “faculty of communication”, “faculty of communication and public relations” as keywords. Facebook provides access to paid advertising, but the target groups must be well defined, while the news feed may lead to loss of information in the multitude of posts a user has access to.

Under these circumstances, it seems that the Google ads are much more useful as they allow the posting of the faculty curriculum among the first results when a user searches for a university offer.

Another answer to this question was From family/friends (48%). As shown above, the UCDC–CRP students were persuaded, to a larger extent, by their family or friends what faculty to choose.

There are several explanations for the role the family plays in guiding the high school graduates to choose a faculty. First of all, there is the affective relationship between young people and their families that can take the form of consulting and advising. The economic factor should not be omitted especially when the parents finance their student children throughout the years of studies, or fully or partially pay the tuition fee whenever the case.

This indicator is an important sign also for universities. Promotional messages should reach potential candidates as well as their parents. This observation is valid for both conventional, printing-based promotion and online ads. Internet promotion requires complex audience settings to include both 18-21 years old people (potential candidates), and 40-55


years old adults (potential parents). Besides family, friends can make a decisive contribution to choosing a

faculty. We believe that private faculty students can be influenced by friends to a large extent because private universities operate mostly in Bucharest and most students, including the UCDC–CRP students involved in our study, are from Bucharest. In this respect, faculties could create promotion messages among their own students to persuade their friends to enrol in the same university. Incentives could be granted by reducing the tuition fees for the respective students.

A third answer to this question was After a visit to the faculty/university during A Different School Week, 13%. It seems that this programme, A Different School, is successful in informing high school pupils about the study offers of the universities. Consequently, the faculties should develop their own promotion strategies, besides those of the universities, for the week they are visited by high schoolers.

The other answers accounted for less that 10%. One may notice that as far as UCDC–CRP is concerned, the method of distributing promotional materials to high school graduates when exiting from the baccalaureate exam and the method of visits by faculty professors to high schools bear results, although moderate in point of percentage.

To question no. 3, What are your expectations from your faculty during the years of studies? (a multiple choice question), most of respondents (N=100), 74%respectively, said that they wanted a professional specialization so as to be competitive on the labour market.

Table 14. Students answer to question included in the survey. 3: What are

your expectations from your faculty during the years of studies?

Total (%)

SNSPA–CRP(%)

UCDC–CRP(%)

Let me train in order to be competitive in the labor market

72 74 70

I think I get rather theoretical 8,0 8 8 I have no waiting time being, I'll see along the way offering faculty

25 20 30

DK / NR 1 2 0

Therefore, the dominant expectation of the respondents included in this study from a Communication and Public Relations faculty is to get a professional specialisation. Both student groups have options close in


point of percentage. But the low score obtained by the second variant, that of receiving a rather theoretical instruction, proves, in our opinion, optimism and the fact that the first-year students have no idea what university courses consist of. According to curricula, which are similar at a national level, students will benefit from very many theoretical courses and few practical courses of professional instruction activities. It is possible that this gap between the students’ expectations when enrolling in a faculty and the reality of the tuition provided contributes to the rather high rate of university dropout (see Table 6).

A significant percentage of the respondents included in this research, 25%respectively, preferred to stay neutral with regard to their expectations from the faculty and to form an opinion during the years of studies. One may notice that the UCDC–CRP students chose this variant. The hypothesis could be advanced that when enrolling, they do not know what university tuition means and that they do not have enough information about the bachelor’s degree specialisation they have chosen. That is why faculties should establish a relationship with their potential students as early as high school, inform them about the profile of the faculty, possibly involve them in activities in order to familiarise them with what they will study. Otherwise, the students dissatisfied with what they learn in the first year can drop out as they discover that their expectations are not fulfilled.

To question no. 4, How do you picture yourself professionally after graduation? (a multiple choice question), most respondents (N=100), respectively 55%, answered that they would enrol in master’s degree courses.

Table 15. Students answer to question included in the survey. 4: How do

you picture yourself professionally after graduation?

Total (%)

SNSPA–CRP(%)

UCDC–CRP(%)

I work in the field where I specialized in college

50 58 42

You looking for a job, regardless of the field

18 16 20

If I do not immediately engage in the field where I specialized in college, I'll wait

12 14 10

I will emigrate to find a job 4 2 6 I will subscribe to master 55 52 58


If I find a job in which I specialize, I will enroll in another college

2 4 0

I will do anything 3 6,0 0 DK / NR 3,0 2 4

Both groups of respondents say that they want to continue their

education after the three bachelor’s degree years of studies, although they have not yet begun studying. An analysis of the answers from the angle of higher education organisation, under the Bologna Process, evinces that the respondents have a fair version since the three-year bachelor’s degree specialisation is the first stage of their speciality education. But it is highly improbable that the students included in this study know such details. They could consider the master’s degree studies as a form of continuing their education all while further benefiting from the financial support of their families.

The second answer, in point of frequency, is I shall work in the field I specialised for at the faculty; 50%of the respondents ticked this option. This expectation is a priority for the SNSPA–CRP students, while their UCDC–CRP colleagues are more likely to continue their master’s degree studies.

The respondents’ optimism, that they will get a job after their bachelor’s degree years of studies is not confirmed by specialised research. In keeping the Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014in the labor market, prepared by the Executive Unit for the Financing of Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation (UEFISCDI), only 23% of the social sciences graduates got jobs in a domain related to the bachelor’s degree specialisation studies in the first six months since graduation24.

Part of the students included in our study, 18%respectively, are aware that they will not find a corresponding job. This option was chosen mostly by the UCDC–CRP students. A possible explanation could be the fact that they did not enroll in the year they graduated from high school and, probably, they experienced the requirements of the labor market, which does not assess studies properly. Only 12% of respondents claim that they will not accept any job and will wait until they find a job in the domain they specialised for.

24 Raportul studiului de monitorizare a inserției pe piațamuncii a absolvenților – promoțiile

2010 și 2014, (Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labour market) p. 48-49.


The rest of the options accounted for less than ten per cent, being statistically insignificant.

6. Limitations of the research The observations and discussions presented in our study cannot be

expanded nationwide. The research covered only two faculties of Communication and Public Relations in Bucharest and we analysed only one class of first-year students. In the future, we shall expand our study to other university centres and we shall compare more classes in order to write down their stable opinions regarding their reasons when choosing a Communication and Public relations faculty, as well as their expectations from this bachelor’s degree specialisation.

Another limitation of this study is the use of only one working instrument, namely the questionnaire. Had he used the semi-structured interview applied to a number of five respondents from each surveyed faculty, the researcher could have sorted out some presuppositions and intuitions raised in this analysis.

7. Conclusions and recommendations This research has identified a number of important aspects of the

early relationship between the first-year students and the higher learning institutions. On the one hand, universities failed to establish a partnership between faculties and potential students so that the enrolling young people should have a correct image of the education they are provided, of the chances of getting integrated in the labour market etc. There are models of retaining potential students such as recruiting them since high school, highly efficient in the Anglo-American universities.

Correct information about the future students will diminish both their dissatisfaction with regard to faculties and the abandonment rate. The first-year students have great expectations as regards the professional education a faculty of Communication and Public Relations will provide, but, as curricula are structured nationwide, they will receive a rather theoretical tuition. Possibly, they can be counselled during the first year of studies, when no practical activities are performed, so that they can develop expectations for the following years. As this study has already revealed, most of the investigated students claim that they have chosen this specialisation because they possess the necessary skills, and if they feel that their potential is not capitalised they will be likely to drop out. Preferably, the faculties of Communication and Public Relations liaise


their students with specialised companies as early as their junior year, since most students hope they will work in a relevant department after graduation.

This research has identified some new trends as concerns the dissemination of the curricula provided by universities among the baccalaureate graduate community. The majority of the respondents included in this research claims they found information about the faculty they enrolled in on the internet. Their generation is almost permanently connected to the internet especially by means of their cell phones, and this communicational reality should concern the marketing departments of the universities. Advertising costs on the internet are cheaper than those on paper and the target groups are more easily reachable. On the other hand, this research has evinced the important role the family has in a baccalaureate graduate’s decision on enrolling in a faculty. Consequently, the advertising companies should take into consideration the age category of the parents of their potential students.

REFERENCES Executive Unit for the Financing of Higher Education, Research,

Development and Innovation (UEFISCDI), Raportul studiului de monitorizare a inserției pe piața muncii a absolvenților – promoțiile 2010 și 2014 (Report on the monitoring of the integration of the graduates of classes 2010 and 2014 in the labour market), http://sapm.forhe.ro/rezultate (accessed on 30 November 2016).

Ministry of Education, Raport privind starea învățământului superior în România – 2015 (Report on the status of higher education in Romania – 2015), 5 September, 2016, https://www.edu.ro/raport-privind-starea-%C3%AEnv%C4%83%C8%9B%C4%83m%C3%A2ntului-superior-%C3%AEn-rom%C3%A2nia-2015 (accessed on 26 November 2016).

National Council for Higher Education Financing, Raport public anual – 2014 (Annual Public Report – 2014). Starea finanțării învățământului superior și măsurile de optimizarece se impun (State of Higher Education Financing and the required optimisation measures), 15 June 2015, http://www.cnfis.ro/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/CNFIS-Raport-public2014_final.pdf (accessed on 26 November 2016).

National Integrated Register, Nomenclatoarele domeniilor și specializărilor/ programelor de studiiuniversitare2016-2017 (Lists of university domains and specialisations/curricula for 2016/2017,


https://www.rei.gov.ro/index.php?&c=31&ddpN=1603056339&we=064a0196806f1159ce5df19dc5369c58&wf=dGFCall&wtok=419edb55fb90d2a28610ba7a012bf61954ec46d9&wtkps=FcrNDYAgDEDhXTpB+WmFsoM7VISE6A0TDsbdhdtL3qfi5O1CAuO57g6piYscyaQ+D/R2wiorkA0X9QdqzkgYat08UeBgWasyuuUmGwXSnr4f&wchk=659951a9ad23d3734cd0186e59c583cefc00f9de (accessed on 1 December 2016).

Optiuni.ro, Programe de licență (Bachelor), http://optiuni.ro/search/?programType=license&supraDomains=11

,10&domains=35 (accessed on 3 December 2016).


WE ARE WHAT WE LEARN: STUDIES AS A FUNCTION OF IDENTITY IN ADULT EDUCATION

CRİSTİNA NİCOLAESCU

[email protected]

“It's not what we eat but what we

digest that makes us strong; […] not what we read but what we

remember that makes us learned; and not what we profess but what we

practice that gives us integrity.” (Francis Bacon)

Abstract: This paper is based on andragogical research conducted at higher

education level and carried out to reveal the close relation between learning styles and learners’ identity as well as to investigate the consequences of such styles while studying various subjects for a particular specialization in a particular socio-cultural environment. The second issue that deserves attention in this investigation is the axiomatic hidden mutuality between the study and learners in the sense that not only the personality type shapes the learning style but also how and what we study can have a heavy influence on one’s identity. To the reacher, the main concern is that such influence is positive both personally and professionally, as transformative learning, since we are what we learn.

Keywords: identity, transformative learning, andragogy. By paraphrasing the famous expression “we are what we eat”, the

present article emphasizes the modelling role of study on learners’ identity in higher education. The purpose of choosing this topic is first of all to reinforce an issue that may be sometimes overlooked or belittled: the psychological dimension of the didactic act. Not only does a student’s personality determine the learning style, but more important, what is studied and how will leave a clear mark on one’s identity. The activities already conducted provide basic evidence that psychology of learning should be guided with as much care as the teaching act itself. The

Associate Professor, PhD., Erciyes University, Faculty of Letters, Department of English Language and Literature – Kayseri, Turkey.


question raised in this research endeavour is how the Instructor1 identifies the need of harmonizing instruction to various learning styles of the students’ group and more important what is the beneficial intervention in this adjustment. Certainly, the logic of this rapport is evident, since normally experienced instructors are aware of his/her students’ learning practices. But the mere identification is of no use unless this item of information becomes the core of the rapport between Instructor and learners. Bonny Norton describes a learner’s identity as multiple, a site of struggle, and subject to change2. The question raised about identity formation in the process of learning is how the subject matter or content of study influences the specific functions of brain, in other words why a student trained in sciences acquires a foreign language in a different way that a student of humanities. Is this a matter of habit got uncounsciously of how to apply study strategies or the brain development has occurred in a different way in learners of the same age? The findings of neuroscience support the idea of individual differences in the socio-cognitive abilities and explain the structural and functional changes that occurr in the brain. While understanding how these vary in individuals of different previous life and learning experience, choosing the appropriate educational approach is still a hard nut to crack. Neurophisiological maturation is the origin of human potential for high cognitive abilities in adult age, only that this is a general assumption and the educators need to look further into psychology to add nature/nurture arguments to the biologial support:

Neuroscience findings cannot yet be transferred directly to the

improvement of educational techniques. Understanding the biological basis of memory, learning and higher cognitive functions has not turned out to automatically lead to ways of improving them. In fact, there is already a backlash of those who claim that, really, neuroscience will never offer teachers very much that will actually help their classroom practice.3

1 This is a general term that can be read as teacher, tutor etc. 2 Norton, Bonny, Identity and Language Learning: Extending the Conversation. Bristol:

Multilingual Matters, 2013, p.45. 3 Jarvis, Peter and Parker, Stella, Human Learning A holistic approach, London and

New York: Routledge, 2005, p.33.


Even if it is not easy matter to establish the connection between brain functions and a certain learning style as applied to a certain learning content, there is hope for the future to be able to adapt teaching methodology to the variety of learning needs our students may have in a socio-culturally mixed group. There is a plethora of variables in education that needs to be taken into account, especially when the aim is not the generalization of processes, but searching for the particulars discovered in practice, which make each case study unique and intriguing. How a particular type of identity influences the learning style and how learning affects identity have been constant questions in pedagogy and andragogy, and have received different answers in the specialty literature. Piaget, Hayes, Flannery, Crane and others have mainly described learning as a complex process of assimilation and accommodation. Cumulative learning is more specific to learning in childhood, but the main concern is transformative learning in adult age. This is a very demanding developmental stage that may affect personality in a profound way, which is for everyone to take care of and direct:

through everyday consciousness we control our own learning and non-learning in a manner that seldom involves any direct positioning while simultaneously involving a massive defence of the already acquired understandings and, in the final analysis, our very identity.4

Once we express our uniqueness through social and cultural identity

we are aware of who we are and carry the responsibility for knowledge and behavior, as repeatedly performed experiences modulated by emotions and morality, since this is the basis that help us operate in the world. But if a learner enters into a new social and cultural environment, he or she needs to adjust accordingly:

if that basis is no longer reliable then we can become disoriented. Wemay try to learn the reasons for the mismatch between our experience and newrealities, and then incorporate what we have learned into a new basis of experience.5

It is obvious that environment is highly influential but also is

knowledge for the way we think and behave. The acquisition of a foreign

4 Ibidem p.96 5 Ibidem p.217


language, for instance, may reveal the strength and weaknesses of the student as a learner. In andragogical research, learning is regarded as self-directed and controlled, oriented towards a various field of specialization that shapes thinking based on specific skills and abilities. In its turn, this orientation has an impact on identity as a major factor among others, internal and external:

Identity formation is a complex notion and according to differing interpretations is based in psychological or sociological factors, internal or external influences, conscious or unconscious processes and early childhood or adult variables.6

Certainly, acquired knowledge is a large part of what we are in the

nature-nurture relationship. As mentioned before, biology, neuroscience and psychology have provided arguments for identity formation and shaping, but the variables create different typologies: “Learning is conceptualised in terms of both universal and contextual characteristics”.7 In other words, the general pattern of human development is not sufficient for educational practice, as long as individual, particular characteristics may modify it. Consequently, we are what we learn and what we want to become by building a self:

An individual’s life experience, together with her/his biological make-up, contribute to the making of a human learner. These contributory factors give rise to the notion of ‘self’.8

Life experiences make the difference in learning, in what they

contribute to the practice of social interaction and more preeminently, they may be traced in the way an individual regards the world and oneself. As to the study of languages, neuropsychology and neurolinguistics have informed pedagogy and andragogy in support of the idea that learning is a part of identity in this sense.

All theories of intellectual development point to the

importance of adult experience. The recurring theme in all these

6 Hayes, E., and Flannery, D., Women as Learners: The Significance of Gender in

AdultLearning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2000, p.174 7 Jarvis, Peter and Parker, Stella, Human Learning A holistic approach, London and

New York: Routledge, 2005, p.218 8 Ibidem p.217


conceptions is that adults grow as learners because of their life experiences. It is likely that experience enables adults to apply their learning more effectively as it strengthens their ability to manage learning processes. Conversely, as adults become better at applyingtheir learning and managing their learning processes, they expect opportunities to do just that. In andragogical terms, they seek more control over their learning process.9

In conclusion, control is what best defines adult education and

undoubtedly it assures learning independence and responsibility. In this line of thought, transformative learning is undersuch control and self-directed. It presupposes tactful guiding on the part of educators, while research continues in andragogy with multidisciplinary approaches.

REFERENCES Hayes, E., and Flannery, D., (2000), Women as Learners: The Significance

of Gender in Adult Learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Jarvis, Peter and Parker, Stella, (2005), Human Learning A holistic

approach, London and New York: Routledge. Knowles, M.S., Holton, E., & Swanson, A., (2005), The Adult Learner,

Boston, MA: Elsevier Butterworth Heineman, 6th edition. Norton, Bonny, (2013), Identity and Language Learning: Extending the

Conversation. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

9 Knowles, M.S., Holton, E., & Swanson, A., The Adult Learner. Boston, MA: Elsevier

Butterworth Heineman, 6th edition, 2005, p.210


PERSONAL AXIOGENESIS OF FIREFIGHTERS AND RESCUERS IN THE CONDITIONS OF SOCIAL

TRANSFORMATIONS

V.I. VUS,

[email protected]

S.M. KRAVCHUK

[email protected]

Abstract: The article is devoted to the problem of professional self-realization of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services in the conditions of social transformations. The relevance of searching of the social and psychological ways of the efficiency of professional, social and psychological functioning of firefighters and rescuers is noted, as the further destinies of many people, families and settlements depend on the quality and efficiency of their activities. The specifics of their valuable and semantic comprehension of the surrounding reality are considered. Axiogenesis of firefighters and rescuers is studied at the emotional, cognitive and conative levels. The research was performed on the basis of the method of “Valuable orientations”. Using of the specified technique has allowed constructing the personal “axiomatrix”, researching the “three-dimensional” structure of the individual consciousness and revealing positive valuable and semantic transformations of the individual consciousness. It is asserted that the specifics of their valuable comprehension of the world are caused by the cumulative impact of professional, social and individual and psychological factors. The personal axiogenesis of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services in the conditions of social transformations occurs against the background of activation of intellectualization and rationalization processes. A need of the growth of the qualitative indexes of social support, social fasilitation, an improvement of social and psychological conditions of personal functioning of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services is actual.

Keywords: axiogenesis, specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services,

professional genesis, self-actualization.

PhD. in psychology, associative professor (Interregional Academy of Personnel Management, Ukraine).

Master degree in psychology, PhD. student.


Introduction Specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services differ in their greatest

proximity to the consequences of challenges of the present, tragic results of social transformations. The further destinies of many people, families and settlements depend on the quality of their activities. However, social and psychological characteristics of the professional activity and specifics of the personal reflection of tragic events do not promote, to a considerable extent the process improvements of professional competence obtaining, internal potential expansion, and causing, respectively, a decrease in the efficiency of their professional actions. The specified features of the professional genesis of firefighters and rescuers promote a considerable staff turnover in this service and personal deformations of the specialists.

Tragic challenges and social transformation actualize the search of social and psychological ways to increase the efficiency of professional, social and psychological functioning of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services.

The aim of the paper consists in studying of the specifics of the personal axiogenesis of firefighters and rescuers.

Methods and methodology. The structure of the content description of this research consists of the quantitative and high-quality analysis of the results of empirical studying of psychodiagnostic indicators of the value-semantic sphere in the context of studying of social and psychological determination of self-actualization experience by the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services.

For this reason, the technique “Valuable orientations” is applied (V.I. Vus)1 [2]. The technique consists of 56 valuable statements, allowing to provide the structure of human value orientations in several spheres:

1. In substantial – seven classes of valuable orientations: practical and everyday; social; political; informative; ethical; esthetic; religious.

2. In representative – the procedure of carrying out a research, according to the technique, consists in ranging of the values, selected by the participant of the experiment (on 10 “positive” and “negative”) in three series of material presentation, which correspond to three representative plans (the forms of understanding and assimilation) of the valuable and semantic content of the analyzed material: emotional and sensual, informative and cognitive and efficient and practical.

1 Vus V.I., The process of personality socialization at condition of global transformation of society Kyiv, NULES, 2014, 210 p.


This technique allows: • constructing the personal “axiomatrix” • studying of the “three-dimensional” structure of the individual

consciousness; • revealing positive valuable and semantic transformations of the

individual consciousness. The research was conducted according to the standard procedure and

according to the European standards of ethics of psychological researches. The empirical base of the research was constituted by 144 employees

of rescue and fire-fighting services (Ukraine). Results and discussion. According to the results of the conducted

empirical research on the specifics of valuable attitude of firefighters and rescuers the emotional domination of the values of social (M = 14,50), informative (M = 12,61) and esthetic (M = 8,00) modes has been established. The values of mystical (M = 0,33) mode are distinguished by their slightest emotional priority for the participants of the experiment.

We can consider the lowest indicators of the emotional priority of mystical values as a certain “internality” of one’s own activity reflection. That is, the specifics of the professional activity of firefighters and rescuers provoked forming in them a habit and emotional satisfaction from relying only on their own capabilities, opportunities, resources, but not on the expectations of some external help.

At the same time, the statistically revealed domination of social and informative modes is connected with the greatest distinction of their emotional valuable priority determination (σ = 6,33 and 7,53). In other words, the ambiguous emotional and valuable perception of the available social realities against the background of active cognitive and intellectual searches is observed.

The obtained results can be interpreted as the orientation of emotional efforts of the personality to intellectualization and rationalization of self-assessment of the quality of his own involvement into the system of social interaction. However, the discovered orientation of the emotional efforts of the examinees has its multivector and multi-aspect character of the personal relations.

Quantitative results of studying of the valuable dominants with an emotional mode of assessment are given in table 1.

The emotional and valuable dominants are seen by the participants in


the values “outdoor recreation” (M = 5,61) and “to know how to work with the equipment” (M = 5,28). The low emotional and valuable mark was obtained in the values “to plan”(M = 1,83) and “communication with friends” (M = 1,89).

The registered fact of low emotional and valuable comprehension of the value of “communication with friends” we can consider in such contexts:

-ambiguity in the relations and perception of social values; the internal nature of the emotional reflection of one’s own activity.

For this reason, we can interpret the obtained result as follows: - deepening / deformation of the “internality” of the emotional self-

reflection nature (an increase in the tendency to rely only on one’s own strengths and opportunities);

- “blurring” of valuable and semantic borders of the phenomena “personal friends”, “friendship” and the “quality of relations”;

- feeling of deprivation of a need for trusting relationships; - transformation of social perception mechanisms; - searching of the more emotional and acceptable forms of social

interaction comprehension. At the same time, the fixed facts of determination of the emotional

priority of social values, the low emotional approval of interaction with friends, relatives and the emotional need for rest and relaxation we can interpret as:

- ambivalence of the valuable and semantic sphere development; - emotional dissonance of the available social reality perception; - a tendency to personal isolation, internal isolation (as a process of

searching for new meanings). Empirical results of studying of the cognitive structure of the

valuable and semantic sphere of examinees allowed determining the nature of understanding and the system of the importance of life priorities.

The greatest importance the participants are also inclined to provide to the values of social (M = 12,44) and intellectual (M = 11,33) spheres. Though, the specified values also differ in the most ambiguous attitude towards them from the examinees (σ = 8,07 and 8,13). The least important values they are inclined to consider are the mystical mode values (M = 0,16).


That is some similarity in emotionally and cognitive valuable comprehension of the world is observed.

At the cognitive and positive level of the valuable and semantic sphere the values “peace” (M = 6,61) and “friendship, romanticism, love” differ in the greatest importance (M = 4,55) for the participants. The smallest weight they are inclined to give to the values “help to the older, aged people” (M = 1,88) and “memory of the dead” (M = 1,88) (see Table 2).

The domination of the values “peace” and “friendship, romanticism, love” can be considered as the participants’ understanding of the importance of a favorable context, comfort in the interaction of both with the social whole, and with small groups. The examinees are inclined to provide their appreciation to the social support of their own activity. The social approval, the favorable social background is determined by them as the necessary and important instrument of the effective expansion of the personal potential.

Though at the same time they are inclined to give the smallest assessment to the “communication with friends” (M = 2,16). That is certain differentiation in their consciousness of such categories as “the available real friend” and “friendship”, “the quality of relations” is traced; “available real friends” and “peace”, “rest”.

Much lower values of the statements “help to people” and “memory of the dead” can be interpreted as the availability of certain “fatigue” from:

-the fact that the society perceives them just as the instrument of the help, saving;

- the lack of proper, valuable and identical return response of the society to the acts of help (the lack of the system of equal social remuneration) performed by firefighters and rescuers

- frequencies of personal meetings with the death, destructions and catastrophic crashes.

The obtained result confirms our previous thought that the

examinees feel deprivations of a need for trusting relationships, the availability of the aggravated need for social facilitation of their personal and professional activity.

The conative and positive structure of the values and meanings of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services is provided by the following hierarchical system:

� domination of the informative sphere and priorities of social interaction


� irrelevances of the mystical sphere. The participants’ assessment of the relevance degree of the

informative and intellectual (M = 11,13) and social (M = 10,50) spheres almost twice exceeds the assessment of the relevance of pragmatical (emotional, sensual and material values) and ethical spheres (M = 5,83).

The semantic analysis of the concept “ethics” specifies understanding of the ethical sphere, as the systems of representations, an algorithm and specifics of the forms of personal identity projection to the sphere of social interaction (ethos –Greek – that marks out the person from the circle of others)2 [2]. In other words, in the context of the revealed valuable discrepancies of self-perception (the informative and intellectual sphere), perception of the nature of social interaction and the relation to available material and emotional and sensual resources it is possible to speak about:

-dissatisfaction with the quality of social interaction; -the relevance for the new forms of social activity implementation for

the examinees; -activization of the processes of intellectualization and rationalization

of the nature of perception of the available vital realities. The specified opinion completely will be approved with the low

social and material stimulation, support of the professional activity of firefighters and rescuers, and, respectively, the available staff turnover in the work of the Ministry of Emergency Situations [3]. The specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services try to intellectualize and rationalize definitely the lack of the adequate material and social support of the professional actions, performed by them in difficult conditions.

Examinees find the greatest relevance in the value of “peace” (M = 4,72), “to know how to work with the equipment” (M = 3,44) and “communication with friends”, “friendship” (M = 3,16) (see Table 3).

That is, it is possible to interpret the shown specifics of hierarchy of urgent values somehow that as the urgent valuable priorities of the examinees act:

-the availability of favorable social and psychological conditions for the common society development;

2 Vus V.I., The process of personality socialization at condition of global transformation of

society Kyiv, NULES, 2014, 210 p.


-social support and facilitation on macro - and micro levels; -an increase in the level of technical competence and security; -improvement of the quality of interpersonal interaction; -improvement of the social and psychological climate in professional

collectives.

Conclusions - the specifics of firefighters and rescuers valuable comprehension of

the world are caused by the cumulative impact of professional, social and individual and psychological factors;

- ambivalence of the valuable and semantic sphere development (psychological dissonance of perception of the available vital realities) is traced.

- personal axiogenesis occurs against the background of activization of the processes of intellectualization and rationalization (as the attempts to adapt effectively to the lack of adequate materials and social support of the professional actions, performed by them);

- there is an active process of meaning-formation, searching for the new meanings, new forms of the professional and social activity implementation;

- the tendency to personal “isolation”, “internality” of expansion of one’s own potential in social and professional spheres is traced;

- discontent with the quality of interpersonal interaction in macro - and micro groups has been revealed; differentiation of the concepts “friendship, support” and “available friends, surrounding” in their perception;

- there is an urgent need for qualitative indices increasing, pointing at social support, social facilitation, improvement of social and psychological conditions of personal functioning.

Compliance with Ethical Standards: Funding and Conflict of Interest: Viktor Vus: The author analyzed data obtained, wrote and prepared

for print publication. Sergiy Kravchuk: The author collected materials, analyzed data

obtained. This research was carried out as a part of the author’s thesis on PhD degree.

Ethical approval: All procedures, performed in studies, involving human participants, were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964


Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Table 1 see here

Table 1 Quantitative indices of studying of the emotional and positive valuable priorities of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services (n = 144)

according to the technique "Valuable orientations" (Vus V.I.) № Valuable statements М Σ

1 Outdoor rest 5,61 2,95 2 To know how to work with the equipment 5,28 6,83 3 Peace 4,28 4,76 4 Friendship, romanticism, love 4,17 3,63 5 All-side personalitydevelopment: to bef ond of art, sport,

music 3,39 4,71

6 To be glad, activity 3,28 2,82 7 Heroism, to save 2,56 3,03 8 Money, wealth 2,00 3,19 9 Communication with friends 1,89 2,60 10 To plan 1,83 3,25

Table 2 see here

Table 2 Quantitative indices of studying of cognitive and positive valuable

priorities of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services (n=144) according to the technique "Valuable orientations" (Vus V.I.)

№ Valuable statements М σ 1 Peace 6,61 4,81 2 Friendship, romanticism, love 4,55 3,85 3 To know how to work with the equipment 3,88 4,15 4 The youth, beauty, health 2,83 3,63 5 To be glad, activity 2,38 3,12 6 To plan 2,33 3,21 7 Outdoor rest 2,16 3,27 8 Communication with friends 2,16 2,99 9 Help for older and aged people 1,88 3,08 10 Memory of the died, respect 1,88 3,41

Table 3 see here


Table 3 Quantitative indices of studying of conative and positive valuable

priorities of the specialists of rescue and fire-fighting services (n=144) according to the technique "Valuable orientations" (Vus V.I.)

№ Valuable statements М σ 1 Peace 4,72 4,89 2 To know how to work with the equipment 3,44 3,95 3 Communication with friends 3,16 3,68 4 Friendship, romanticism, love 3,16 3,63 5 All-sidepersonality development: to be fond of art,

sport, music 2,77 4,06

6 Science, study 2,77 3,78 7 To succeed in life 1,94 2,94 8 Mental work 1,94 3,50 9 To be glad, activity 1,72 2,73 10 To be interested in the social life 1,72 3,04

REFERENCES

Bakhov, I.S., (2014), Dialogue of cultures in multicultural education.

World Applied Sciences Journal, 29(1), 106-109. doi:10.5829/idosi.wasj.2014.29.01.13775. Elektronnyy resurs: http://www.dsns.gov.ua/ua/Zvitni-materiali-

Derzhavnoyi-sluzhbi-Ukrayini-z-nadzvichaynih-situaciy.html Popovich, M., (1999), VSE Universal'nyyslovar'- entsiklopediya [Tekst],

Kyiv: Irina 1551p. Vus V.I., (2014), The process of personality socialization at condition of

global transformation of society Kyiv, NULES.


TRAINING OF TEACHERS-REALITIES AND PERSPECTIVES

TATIANA NAGNIBEDA – TVERDOHLEB

[email protected]

Abstract: Training of teachers in pre-university education reflects a

learning process, completing professional skills and deepening the knowledge of the main career. This process takes place in accordance with the regulations issued by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Moldova and is an action which relates to a certain situation, specifically, teaching resources. Therefore training of teachers as a direct impact on increasing the quality of the educational process.

Keywords: Professional training, development career training,

institutional orientation, continuous professional development of teachers, strategy of methodology, continuous education, learning throughout life, adult education.

The concept of continuous training of teachers represents a

contributory factor for the development of the educational system and increase of the quality of education in the Republic of Moldova. The Code of Education qualifies continuous development of training of adults as: “part of all life learning, which ensures continuous access to knowledge, information, culture, flexible to adapt the individual to the new social-economic realities that are always changing, and to develop necessary professional skills for professional and social activity”. The same document states that: “Professional development of teachers, science teacher, science and management is performed in institutions of higher education and / or institutions of continuous training, other providers of educational services based on accredited professional training programs, through:

o training courses and professional education institutions or research organizations accredited in the country and abroad;

* General Director, General Department of Education, Youth and Sport, Chișinău

Municipal Counsel.


o participation as partners in educational projects and / or national and international research;

o participation with speeches and / or research works at conferences, seminars, symposia, international exhibitions”.1

Based on these stipulations of the Education Code, and other rules

and regulations of education, participation in internships, projects, seminars, international conferences is an effective way for professional development which contribute to the quality of education.

According to the Code of Education, lifelong, as continuous professional study, is any learning process in which an employee, having already a profession or a degree, completes his professional skills by deepening knowledge in primary domain or learning new methods or procedures applied in the specialty concerned. This is done according to the Regulation, approved by the Government. Training courses are conducted in centers for training in the faculties of higher education institutions, but also in other public or private institutions that are accredited by law. Teacher training is mandatory and is done at least once every 5 years.

At European, as well as national level, is given increasingly importance to continuous professional training. This is not considered only as a means of personal development of employees, but an investment in human capital development, with an impact on the increase of quality of work and life. In recent years, lifelong learning has become globally a priority of education systems. Although the role of basic education, formal, remains essential, lifelong learning, along with non-formal education come to customize and develop skills closer to the market and society requirements.

Professional development, in general, has been studied by many researchers. Thus, R. Mathis studies the concept of professional training; V. Blackburn, G. Moisan reflect the specific of continuous learning in European Community countries; G. Gonfroy illustrates teachers' professional development priorities; Dave R. underlines the concept of lifelong learning; R. Nicolaescu strategy addresses the ongoing training of teachers. In the Republic of Moldova, the problem is investigated by Gutu

1 Education Code of the Republic of Moldova. Chișinău, 2014. http://lex.justice.md/md/355156/


V.,23 Pîslaru Vl., Callo T.,4 Bucun N., Bush T.,5 Cojocaru V. Gh.,6 Baciu S., Cara A., Dandara O.,7 Andriţchi V., Panis A.

Professional development is an investment in the human capital, and its effect is manifested by increase of the availability of employees, certainty that they will succeed in achieving a quality end product. To achieve high-quality professional development, a teacher should know their current needs for training, so that on this basis to take the correct decisions in professional life.

According to bibliographical sources, the development of teachers “reflects an education system which is composed of objectives, contents, forms, educational techniques that provide maintenance and continuous improvement of potential cognitive, affective and personality of the acting teacher”;8 “is a planned process of development that improves the quality of student learning by identifying and meeting individual needs of teachers as in overall context of the educational institution”.9 The above definitions refer to two complementary aspects:

1. The first reflects as priority attending professional courses, with the objective of deepening and obtaining more advanced professional skills;

2. The 2nd definition refers to institutional orientation, which highlights three major sides, report them to individual, groups of interest and the whole school. This approach recognizes the special needs of each member of staff and professional potential as factors contributing to development work.

2 Guțu V., Muraru E., Dandara O., Design Standards for initial professional training in

higher education. Methodological Guide. Chișinău: CE USM, 2003. 87p. 3 Guțu Vl., The university model of initial teachers’ training: conceptual guidelines,

diagnoses and prospective. In: Student – future teacher face to face with school. Chișinău: Educational Center PRO DIDACTICA, 2003. p. 9-16.

4 Callo T., A pedagogy of integrality: Theory and practice. Chișinău: CEP USM, 2007. 171 p. 5 Bush T., Leadership and educational management. Actual theories and practices. Iași:

POLIROM, 2015. 246 p. 6 Cojocaru V. Gh., Renovation of education by implementing the most advanced

management techniques. Chișinău: UPS “I. Creangă”, 2004. 240 p. 7 Dandara O., Suggested realization of the connection between initial and continuing

training. In: Student – future teacher face to face with school. Chișinău: Educational Center PRO DIDACTICA, 2003. p. 26-30.

8 Bontaș I., Pedagogy. Bucharest: ALL, 1994. 248 p. 9 Hopkins D., Ainscow M., West M., Improving school in an era of change. Chișunău,

Prut Internațional, 1998. p. 131.


Reform of teacher training is influenced by two main factors: 1. Calibration of the training system to certain situation by harnessing

the "traditions"; 2. Globalization in teacher training by linking to "foreign"

international experience. We believe that education and teacher training are crucial in ensuring

the opportunities approach to cope with professional challenges, to succeed and defeat, to realize their professional dream. Mircea Stefan mentions that specialized training represents methodological, pedagogical and professional improvement of teachers in the entire education that takes place throughout all career.10 Professional development, in the context of socio-constructivist paradigm, is part of the professional responsibilities of the teacher in his daily activity; indispensable condition for institutional development and for ensuring the quality of educational services.

At present, after Romanian scientist A. Neculau, personality evolution, is an action that relates a specific situation to specific resources. Training is not only transmitting and acquisition, but also influence by interaction, through norms and values proposed by the psychosocial context. The author as well highlights that training does not mean “to add”, but to "develop the existing intellectual potential of the individual, to change the perceptual structures and actions that will change the whole structure of personality.11 Training involves a change of internal hierarchies, involving the achievement of another way to interact, appears as a deep global interference that implies exceeding consumer attitude. Training aims at developing adaptability subject "format", its capacity to act and the power to communicate, to acquiring a culture of interaction".12 Training is, in this context, an action of modeling the person, which complies with the requirements of contemporary society.

Continuous training of teachers, in secondary education in the Republic of Moldova, was organized in previous decadal, in accordance with the Regulation on Service training [HG nr.1224 of 09.11.2004] and is based on the concept of professional development for teaching staff in education, approved by decision of the Ministry of Education College, no.

10 Ștefan M., Pedagogical lexicon. Bucharest: Aramis, 2006. p. 137. 11 Neculau A., Adult education. Iași: Polirom, 2004. p. 12. 12 Ibidem, p. 43-45.


6.1 of 3 April 2003, moreover, based on the Strategic Methodology – regulatory document indicating the actions of implementation of the Concept. These documents provide a general framework that serves as the starting point in the realization of the conceptual setting for continuous training of teachers. Moreover, according to the basic laws and regulations as well as to the current needs of the teachers’ community, were developed national professional standards for teachers in early education institutions that describe expectations on the professional teachers’ activity in early education services. They provide a common benchmark of mandatory skills needed to practice the profession of educator.13

Continuous training, according to the Regulation on Organization of continuous professional training, has the targets as follows:

o facilitate the social integration of persons according to their professional aspirations and labor market needs;

o training of human resources capable of increasing the competitiveness of the workforce;

o building the foundation for the development and realization of the potential of intellectual and creative personality;

o updating knowledge and professional training in the main occupation, and related occupations;

o acquiring advanced knowledge, modern methods and procedures necessary to perform their duties.

To strengthen the professional skills of the teacher leader and

strengthening leadership skills, it is important to ensure the methodological circuit of development in activities of teacher training: initial training – training – self-organizing. This is the determinant of the quality of teaching activities in positions of leadership at school and professional community. We consider important to develop leadership skills both in initial training, and of those that continue, but we emphasize, in this context, self-organizing, which according to the curriculum CFC ECD determines culture autonomy of the teacher, becoming the expression of innovative transformations advertised in the process of education, educational research expressed in the teaching process.

The aim of continuous training, says Gerard Vaysse, one of the

13 Iosifescu Ș., Management training programs for trainers. Methodological Guide. Vol. I,

Bucharest, 1999. p. 12.


prominent specialists in the field, is preparing the citizens to learn throughout life, as the Europe of XXI century will be the one for knowledge. The researcher emits the idea that this process implies a Copernican revolution in professional conscience with lasting effects in practice of a career.14 Teachers are key players in any reform which considers economic development or change society in general. The diversity of educational paradigms concerning the powers of the teaching profession, social and economic dynamics, transforms the teacher into an agent of change. To meet the challenges of a knowledge-based society, it is necessary to transform the educational model where the emphasis is on initial training, the one that will be complemented with the continuous training and preparation which will pursue socio-professional integration and complex individual development. The personality of the teacher becomes more complex, because of the need to respond to new requests.

The concerns of continuous training as a domain of development of the human resources appeared almost simultaneously with the definition of the society of education, moreover, it became primordial because of the great interest of the European Union States, therefore the year of 1996was declared as The European Year for continuous training. This statement left a track, as in March 2000 at Lisbon Summit, was established as a priority the objective, so that within 10 years, to turn the EU into the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy.15

For this reason, it is recommended to stress continuous training process in institutional context, based on certain principles, to conduct a series of activities with theoretical and practical training for each teacher, that will lead to the shaping of continuous training of teachers, so that, making use of the gained knowledge, the teacher will be able to secure a working life, consistent with the objectives which they set for their own career development.

Research approach and the above mentioned conditions in the education system, reflects the urgent need of training in competency training for the teachers of the Republic of Moldova. Both documents, of educational policy (Development Strategy "Education 2020"),16 as well as the

14 Vaysse G., The evolution of initial and continuing training in Europe. In conference: “Priorites-priorities-prioridades” Paris, 2000, 15-17 November. p. 47-55.

15 Strategy from Lisbon 2000, http://www.ciaris.org/workspace_files/223/Bridges_for_Inclusion_European_Overview_EN_march.08.pdf, 50 p. (visited 12.10.2013).

16 Development strategy “Education 2020”


normative regulators (Regulations for the certification of teachers in pre-school, primary, secondary, special, additional, secondary vocational and specialized) requires practical implementation, and teachers need an effective model for developing proficiency training.

The recent conducted analysis, by the Ministry of Education, of the quality of teaching staff, highlighted several issues with major impact on the performance of the education system and importance for our research. Thus, the professional skills of teachers and the ways of developing them are not connected to changes in the education system, therefore requires continuous improvement.17

Changes in the society and the forecast of the acceleration of this process in the stages to come, require as necessary not only to adapt educational systems to the new economic, social, cultural and scientific fields, but as well the training, under such fields, of the capacity to adjust continuously. From this perspective, the principles of lifelong learning become as guidelines to instructive actions, in general, and lifelong education in particular.

The definition of training is more recent, but it was first used by Condorcet in 1792 in a report, presented to the General Assembly during the French Revolution, with a sense rather synonymous to education for the masses. By the mid-twentieth century reference, appear new key words: continuing education and lifelong learning that in essence, express the same types of activities as training.18

Adult education is a an actual research, systematically studied by European countries, as a tremendous resource, for the development of technical, economic, institutional and human society, as well as to ensure equity in terms of respect for equal opportunities. Interest in this area has grown to mid. 90’s of the last century, when it was agreed that education and lifelong learning in adulthood helps maintain economic competitiveness and employment, at the same time being the best way to combat social exclusion. Starting from these premises, lifelong learning became the common guiding principle for the new generation of Community programs in education and training. In response to these studies, in 1995, it was elaborated the White Book of the European

http://particip.gov.md/public/documente/137/ro_1112_STRATEGIA-EDUCATIA-2020.pdf (visited 16.11.2013).

17 Ibidem. 18 Dave R.H., Fundamentals of permanent education. Bucharest: Publisher Didactică şi

Pedagogică, 1992. 417 p.


Commission: Teaching and learning - towards the knowledge society, which is an essential policy in Community lifelong learning and places the responsibility of the individual in the center of the process.

The launching of the European Year of Lifelong learning, in 1996, brings a new report of UNESCO, entitled Education – hidden treasure, also known as the Delors Report, which emphasizes the importance of combining the four fundamental ways to learn throughout life: to learn to know, to learn to do, to learn to live in community, to learn to be.19 These approaches have as the fundamental mission to meet the challenges of the society. Their systemic approach can transform individuals into agents of their own training, the person able to organize and structure knowledge, to discover their individual potential, having formed the judgment and responsibility of active citizenship in the knowledge society. The driving force that brought lifelong learning policy agendas in the 90s of the twentieth century has been the concern to improve citizens' employability and adaptability.

REFERENCES Bontaș, I., (1994), Pedagogy, Bucharest: ALL. Bush, T. (2015) Leadership and Educational Management. Actual theories

and practices, Iași: POLIROM. Callo, T., (2007), A Pedagogy of Integrality: Theory and practice.

Chișinău: CEP USM. Cojocaru, V. Gh., (2004), Renovation of education by implementing the

most advanced management techniques, Chișinău: UPS “I. Creangă”. Dandara, O., (2003), Suggested realization of the connection between

initial and continuing training. In: Student – future teacher face to face with school. Chișinău: Educational Center PRO DIDACTICA.

Dave, R.H., (1992), Fundamentals of permanent education, Bucharest: The Didactic and Pedagogical Publishing House.

Delors, J., The Treasure within. Report to UNESCO of the International Commission for Education in the XXI century

Development strategy “Education 2020” http://particip.gov.md/public/documente/137/ro_1112_STRATEGI

A-EDUCATIA-2020.pdf (visited 16.11.2013).

19 Delors J., The Treasure within. Report to UNESCO of the International Commission for

Education in the XXI century. Iași: Polirom, 2000. 235 p.


Education Code of the Republic of Moldova. Chișinău, 2014. http://lex.justice.md/md/355156/

Guțu, V., Muraru E., Dandara O., (2003), Design Standards for initial professional training in higher education. Methodological Guide. Chișinău: CE USM.

Guțu, Vl., (2003), The university model of initial teachers’ training: conceptual guidelines, diagnoses and prospective. In: Student – future teacher face to face with school, Chișinău: Educational Center PRO DIDACTICA.

Hopkins, D., Ainscow M., West M., (1998), Improving School in an era of change, Chișinău, Prut International.

Iosifescu, Ș., (1999), Management training programs for trainers. Methodological Guide, Vol. I. Bucharest.

Neculau, A., (2004), Adult Education, Iași: Polirom. Ștefan, M., (2006), Pedagogical Lexicon. Bucharest: Aramis. Strategy from Lisbon 2000, ttp://www.ciaris.org/workspace_files/223/Bridges_for_Inclusion_E

uropean_Overview_EN_march.08.pdf, 50 p. (visited 12.10.2013). Vaysse, G., (2000), The evolution of initial and continuing training in

Europe. In conference: “Priorites-priorities-prioridades” Paris, 15-17 November.


STUDY ON THE BARRIERS AND SUPPORT FOR PARTICIPATION TO SOCIAL LIFE OF CHILDREN WITH

DISABILITIES

ANDREI DUMITRU

[email protected] Abstract: Purpose: This exploratory study examined the barriers to

participation to social life amongst children with disabilities from the mothers’ perspective.

Objectives: The objectives of this study were to understand how mothers of children with physical and cognitive disabilities who engaged their children in community-based rehabilitation (CBR) services, perceived and described (1) the level of support they received and the barriers they encountered in terms of their child’s meaningful social participation; (2) the use and awareness of these barriers to identify and pursue advocacy strategies; and (3) hopes for their child’s future.

Methods: Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with each mother in her home.

Results: Findings revealed both support and barriers to the child’s social participation in relationship to their family, friends and community. Support also came from the CBR programme and mothers’ personal resourcefulness. Mothers identified their child’s school, their immediate environment and financial burdens as barriers to participation as well as their own personal insecurities and fears. Strategies to overcome barriers included internal and external actions. The mothers involved in the study hope their child’s abilities will improve with continued CBR services. Some mothers described a bleak future for their child due to a lack of acceptance and access to education.

Conclusion: The findings of this study suggest the significant role the mother of a child with a disability plays in her child’s social participation. Recommendations include enhancing CBR programming for families, especially for mothers, and advocating on behalf of children with disabilities and their families to attract the attention of policy makers.

Keywords: children with disabilities, social life, barriers, mothers of

children.

Associate Professor PhD., State University of Pitești. Department of Medical

Assistance and Kinetic Therapy.


Introduction The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF 2013) estimates that

between 5% and 10% of all children in Romania are children with disabilities; children with disabilities are particularly vulnerable and influenced by the extent of their impairment as well as by the sex of the child. Research focussing on children with disabilities in developing countries suggests that 15% of these children do not attend school and are thus less likely to engage in other opportunities for social participation.

The objectives of this study were to understand how mothers of children with physical and cognitive disabilities who engaged their children in community-based rehabilitation (CBR) services, perceived and described:

- The level of support they received and the barriers they encountered in terms of their child’s meaningful social participation.

- The use and awareness of these barriers to identify and pursue advocacy strategies.

- Expectations for their child’s future. The CBR programme serves a population of approximately 350 000

individuals. Staff members work with children and adults with all types of disabilities. They provide supervision and support to community-based rehabilitation workers (CRWs). A CRW seeks out people with disabilities who can benefit from ability restoring surgeries, therapeutic interventions and educational services as well as home-based rehabilitation services.

Theoretical framework The World Health Organization (WHO 2014) defines disability as

‘impairments, activity limitations and participation restrictions’ including ‘interactions between individuals with a health conditions and personal and environmental factors’. The theoretical framework for this study is based on the International Classification of Functioning (ICF) which shifts the focus away from the cause of a disability to the impact the disability has on the lives of people in society (WHO 2014). The ICF addresses the social model of disability, which regards disability as a social problem


and not an individual’s attribute or impairment1. In the ICF study, participation is considered a chief indicator of child

health, with or without regard for functional ability or diagnosis. Children with disabilities are vulnerable to limited participation, which results from the interaction between children and their physical and social environments2. The significance of this study lies in the examination of the level of support received and the barriers encountered in terms of the social participation amongst children with physical disabilities in Romania, according to their mother’s perspective.

The social action goal is to define barriers to full participation for mothers of children with disabilities for future action with the participants of this study. The action component includes efforts to realise fuller participation in a manner that is consistent with the lived experiences of barriers and in ways that ensure that the basic rights of children with disabilities are met and that they are treated with human dignity.

Literature review Although a few studies explore mothers’ experiences of caring for

children with disabilities in Romanian context no studies were found that address mothers’ perspectives of the barriers they encountered and the level of support they received in terms of their children’s social participation. Several researchers explored environmental factors that impact social participation3. It was examined patterns of community participation and environmental factors that affect community participation for school-aged children with and without disabilities in Romania, and found that stronger efforts are needed to support community participation of school-aged children.

Participation patterns amongst children with disabilities Researchers discovered that children with disabilities tend to be more

restricted in their participation and in the scope of their daily activities (e.g. formal and informal leisure and recreational activities outside of

1 Cojocaru, V., "Social Vulnerability and Intervention" (pp. 533-546). In Neamţu, G.

Treaty social assistance, Iaşi, Polirom (eds.), 201-204. 2 Popa Doiniţa, Sava Aurora, European Practice in school and professional inclusion of

pupils with SEN. Galati: Galati School, 2007, 193-199 3 Law, M., King, G., King, S., Kertoy, M., Hurley, P., Rosenbaum, P. et al., 2006,

‘Patterns and predictors of recreational and leisure participation for children with physical disabilities’, Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology 48(5), 337–342.


school, household tasks and social engagements) than their peers4. Children with disabilities often feel socially isolated.

Centre for Childhood Disability Researches studied 427 children between the ages of 6 and 14 years with physical disabilities to examine their patterns of participation and to determine the child-specific, family and environmental factors that influenced their participation in formal and informal activities5. It was found that some factors are direct predictors of participation and some are more indirect predictors of participation. Child and family preferences were found to be important predictors of children’s participation following adjustment for the child’s functional ability. They found that factors such as family cohesion and parental perceptions of environments were relatively unsupportive, and supportive relationships for the child indirectly influenced child participation.

Direct and indirect predictors of participation Direct predictors of participation include the child’s functional ability

(i.e. cognitive, communicative and physical functioning), family participation in social and recreational activities, family values related to intellectual and cultural activities and child preferences for activities. Indirect predictors of participation include parents’ perceptions of environmental barriers, family cohesion and supportive relationships for the child and family income. They also found that supportive (i.e. accessible, accommodating, socially supportive and nondiscriminatory) and resource-ready environments influenced participation through their effects on children’s functional ability. Greater social support from friends, parents, and teachers also enhanced participation by affecting children’s activity preferences. They concluded that families play an important role in providing opportunities, support and encouragement for children to take part in various activities.

Participation in school and community Participation in school activities is one of the most important

outcomes of children’s inclusion in mainstream. However, researchers

4 Anne Marie Witchger Hansen Musonde Siame, Judith van der Veen (2015), Health of mothers of children with intellectual disability or autism spectrum disorder: A review of the literature, Medical Research, Issue 3, 113-121

5 Gherguţ, Alois, Summaries of Special Psycho-Guide for exams and competitions obtain academic degrees, Iasi: Polirom, 2005, 92-94.


found that children with disabilities in Romania still face restricted participation in comparison with their nondisabled peers.

Harding et al. (2009) interviewed six children with disabilities in Romania to gain a better understanding of how they view their participation in out-of-school-time activities in a range of environmental settings. The children identified aspects of their environments and activities that acted as supports or barriers to their participation. Environment accessibility and physical comfort were noted as supports. Social support came in the form of friends, friendly helpers, pets and neighbours. Lastly, participants’ health statuses were considered a barrier to their participation in some settings6.

Community participation Dumitru Andrei7 examined patterns of community participation and

environmental factors that affect community participation for school-aged children with and without disabilities in Romania and found that stronger efforts are needed to support community participation of these children.

Conclusion It is vital that parents, service providers and policy makers concerned

with children with disabilities understand the barriers to and supports for participation. This study will explore this issue of social participation for children with disabilities in Romania.

Research method and design This is a exploratory study that allowed researchers to explore the

support for and barriers to children with disabilities’ social participation from their mother’s perspective. The methods are phenomenological in nature as this study explored the lived experience of mothers. The design used participatory action research methodologies 8 as it was a collaborative process that equitably involved all partners including mothers, CBR staff

6 Harding, J., Harding, K., Jamieson, P., Mulally, M., Politi, C., Wong-Sing, E. et al.,

‘Children with disabilities’ perceptions of activity participation and environments: A pilot study’, Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy 76, 2009, 133–144.

7 Dumitru, Andrei, Physical Therapy Pediatrics version. Theoretical and applied SITECH Publishing, Craiova, 2016, 147-151.

8 Patton, M.Q., Qualitative research and evaluation methods, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, 2002, 253-256.


and researchers in the research process, and recognises the unique strengths that each stakeholder brings. A further purpose of this qualitative, community-based participatory research was to gain knowledge about social participation of children with disabilities to move into action for social change to improve community programmes to eliminate the difficulties they face.

The specific research questions that guide this research study are as follows:

- How do mothers of children with physical and cognitive disabilities perceive and describe the level of support they receive and barriers to their child’s meaningful social participation?

- How do mothers of children with physical disabilities perceive and describe their understanding of these barriers to identify and pursue advocacy strategies to address these barriers?

- How do mothers of children with disabilities perceive and describe their expectations for their child’s future?

Participants and setting Eleven mothers of children with physical disabilities were

interviewed. In two cases, the mother had passed away and a sister of the mother became the primary caregiver who in both cases was interviewed. Mothers’ ages ranged from 24–45. Their children with disabilities included a total of ten boys and one girl, whose ages ranged from 2–21 and had a diagnosis which included cerebral palsy, spina bifida, cerebral malaria and spinal muscle atrophy. All children had participated in CBR services at some point (see Table 1a, Table 1b and Table 1c). CBR offers intervention programmes to support inclusive education, livelihoods, health and rehabilitation and support for activities of daily living (ADL). Mothers of children with disabilities who participated in this study described the daily occupations of their children in terms of (see Table 1c):

communication activities of daily living mobility play school or education community activities.

Data collection Interviews were between 30 and 60 minutes and took place in each


respondent’s home in various areas in Romania. Interviews were conducted in Romanian language by the research team comprising the primary researcher, coresearcher and a community health worker. Researchers followed a semistructured interview guide.

Data analysis Data analysis began by using a process of open coding. Initially data

was organised qualitatively into open (broad) codes by analysing the responses to the interview questions.

Table 1a: Demographics of the children with disabilities.

Age Number Sex Number Impairment Number Cognition Number 2-5 2 Male 10 Celebral 7 Intact 5 Palsy 6-10 4 Female 1 Spina Bifida 2 Impaired 5 11-15 3 - - Cerebral 1 - - Malaria 19-21 2 - - Spinal 1 - - Muscle Atrophy

Table 1b: Demographics of the children with disabilities.

CBR Age Number Living situation Number

Involvement Began CBR Before 8 months 5 Lives with 10 Services immediate family After 8 months 2 Lives with 1

extended family

Not given 4 - - Duration of Greater than 5 2 - - services Years Less than 5 years 2 - - Not given 7 - -

CBR, community-based rehabilitation


Table 1c: Demographics of the children with disabilities. Activity Daily occupations Number Communication Able to talk 6 Speaks few words 1 Unable to talk 3 NA (2 year-old) 1 Mobility Able to walk 3 Able to walk with support 2 Not able to walk 6 ADLs Independence 6 Partial independence 2 Dependent 3 Play Plays with self 6 Plays with others 5 School Attends school 5 Does not attend school 6 Community activities Participates in activities 6 Does not participate in 5 Activities

ADLs, activities of daily living. Continued comparison of data within and across interviews allowed

the researcher to reduce the data into categories. Central ideas were refined as concepts, and the properties and dimensions of these concepts were identified in such a way that they were delineated; the range of properties of any given category was specified and grouped together.

Results Findings of this study revealed that mothers of children with

disabilities perceived and described family, friends and community as both support for and barriers to the child’s social participation. They also described their personal resourcefulness, staff members and services at the CBR as support. Mothers identified schools, the environmental context and financial burdens as barriers to participation, on one hand, and their own personal weaknesses, insecurities and fears, on the other. In addition, mothers described strategies to overcome barriers in terms of


their internal and external actions. Thus, many mothers described internal strategies such as prayer, a deep faith and trust in God and maintaining a positive attitude as a form of internal action. External strategies, on the other hand, included joining a support group, learning more about disability to better understand their child’s condition, encouraging their child to be more independent in dressing, feeding and playing with other children, and seeking more CBR services.

When asked to describe their expectation for their child’s future, mothers hoped that their child’s abilities would improve and that they would receive support from the CBR programme in the form of equipment and more services. However, others described the future of their children as bleak due to a lack of acceptance and access to education.

Support to social participation Mothers claim that their support for their child’s social participation

is the people and services that encourage the child to engage in social activities in various contexts.

Some mothers described their family as supportive in terms of their child’s social participation; for example, some family members accept the child with a disability and welcome the child to participate in family celebrations and other activities. One mother stated the following: ‘Most family members accept the condition of my son. They invite us to family celebrations. That gives me strength to commit myself to his condition and to improve’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Friends and/or peers A few mothers described their child’s friends as accepting of the child’s

condition and, as a result, they play together. Several mothers reported that younger children in the neighbourhood came to their house to play: ‘When playing with friends he can do more things – like he can do a somersault when crawling and sort out objects and play with toy cars’ (Mother of KB, 6-year-old child with brain damage and cerebral palsy).

Community and/or neighbours Several mothers described the community, particularly their church,

as being supportive and welcome their children to participate in Sunday services; for instance, one mother told a story of how community members used to laugh at her child’s condition during his first few years of his life, but has now come to accept him: ‘Neighbours used to treat him as abnormal but with explanation they understand and accept him as “one of the kids”’ (Mother of MS, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy).


Community-based rehabilitation staff and services Mothers described the CBR as a strong support for their child’s social

participation. Most mothers expressed appreciation for CBR services that support their child’s participation such as movement and mobility therapy, orthopaedic equipment, as well as educational and emotional support:

‘After CBR he can walk better and his arm is in a better position than before. He can then interact with friends and play with them. His attitude has changed too Now he can walk and move around, making life easier. There has been a big change, walking was a problem before, but now he can walk better, and his arm is in a better position than before. He can interact with his friends and play with them. He plays daily without any problem.’ (Mother of MS, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Many mothers described CBR support groups as offering encouragement to their child and provide hope for the future.

Personal resourcefulness Several mothers described their own resourcefulness as strength.

Apart from belonging to support groups, one mother also described her livelihood activities as a support to her child’s participation:

‘By engaging in income generating activities, I feel as if I can help my child engage in more activities and help myself by paying school fees and paying for food.’ (Mother of MP, 11-year-old child with spina bifida)

Barriers to social participation The research established that barriers to social participation for

children with disabilities are in the form of people and services that prevent or discourage these children from engaging in activities.

Family Some mothers claimed family members are a barrier to their child’s

social participation as they do not accept the child: ‘Our families live close by. However, they do not invite us to celebrations. Their family never accepted our son. I think they fear him!’ (Mother of MP, 11-year-old child with spina bifida).

Several mothers reflected how their extended family members or the fathers of the children do not accept their disability and therefore would not help with the child’s care: ‘We have no family members near they live far away and only come to visit us when major problems happen’ (Mother of TM, 8-year-old child with cerebral palsy).


In addition: ‘His father does not accept him! He will not help me take care of him.’ (Mother of FH, 4-year-old child with spinal muscle atrophy)

In some situations, one side of extended family members blames the other family members for the disability:

‘My family and my husband’s family blame another family for my son’s disability. When they are together, they argue about whose fault it is. No one in either family seems to understand disability.’ (Mother of MI, 19-year-old child with cerebral palsy

Friends A few mothers described their children’s friends as a barrier. One

mother told a story of how peers beat her child whilst her other children were carrying him to a CBR institution: ‘One day when his siblings were taking him to the rehab center, they ran into mean kids. His siblings escaped but left him behind. His friends beat him up!’ (Mother of MI, 19-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Community and/or neighbours Many mothers claimed their communities do not accept their child

and, as a result, did not take them to community events: ‘People in the community focus on his disability and laugh at him, so in

those early days, I stopped taking him to any community activities except to church. Some do not take their child to church in fear of being shunned.’ (Mother of MI, 19-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Schools Many mothers described the school environment and teachers as

major barriers to their children’s lack of social participation; for example, a mother described how her disabled son’s teacher told her that he does not have any potential for the future and thus should not take up classroom space:

‘I took him to school but they told me they cannot give him space because they are not equipped to handle a child with a disability. As I was leaving the school she called out that children like mine do not belong in school!’ (Mother of LM, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Several mothers described how head masters of schools accepted their children into their schools, yet the teachers refused to allow children with disabilities into the classroom, claiming they did not have the equipment or skills to accommodate them.

Environment Many mothers described the rough condition of the roads in their


villages, intense traffic patterns in the city and the inaccessible public transport systems as barriers to their children’s social participation. One mother described how hard it is to transport her child in his wheelchair to church, only to go back after wheeling him a short distance as a result of the numerous potholes in the road’s surface and the increasing weight of her 11-year-old son: ‘It is too far to push him in his wheelchair to school, church or social events on this very rough dirt road. We rarely go anyplace, we stay home’ (Mother of FH, 4-year-old child with spinal muscle atrophy).

Financial burdens Many mothers told stories of financial burden that resulted from the

additional expenses of raising a child with a disability. They often lamented that they have little time to earn money whilst caring for their child which requires them to be home all day:

‘Fees for health services from my child, school fees and transportation fees to and from the hospital are a huge financial burden. I take care of my son all day long, and do not have time to find paid work.’ (Mother of TM, 8-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Lack of awareness and understanding of disability related issues Several mothers claimed their families lack awareness regarding

disability and therefore do not understand issues related to disability and are afraid of being near a child with disabilities: ‘Some people in our community ask me questions, like “why are you carrying your son” and “why doesn’t he talk?”. They don’t seem to understand disability’ (Mother of KB, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Personal weaknesses Many mothers described themselves as a barrier to their own

children’s social participation; for example, some mothers indicated that they feel alone and isolated. They expressed both emotional and physical burden: ‘My problems seem so big and the burden is great and falls on me. Everything falls on me!’ (Mother of MS, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘He needs so much more attention than the other children. I do not

have a strong support system, so I feel I need to be near him and with him at all times.’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Many of these mothers described how uncomfortable they feel when


trying to explain to family and friends what it takes to raise a child with a disability. Some mothers feel they lack the basic skills needed to overcome these barriers:

‘I feel stuck! I do not know what to do to advocate for my son. I do not know how to read or write. It is difficult to communicate with others about the burden of his physical condition.’ (Mother of MS, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Several mothers described their reluctance to take their children to community activities because they fear that their children can fall and hurt themselves, and that they can be disruptive to their peers: ‘I cannot take him to church or other places in the community because I fear he will be disruptive and he is too heavy to carry’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Mothers of children aged between 10 and 15 years also complained of their children being too heavy to carry during activities.

Strategies to overcome barriers Mothers of children with disabilities described their strategies to

overcome the barriers to their child’s social participation as internal actions and external actions. Internal strategies are personal, intrinsic actions which mothers employed to address the barriers whilst attempting to engage their children in home, school or community activities. Many mothers described prayer and a deep faith and trust in God as an internal strategy that gives them strength to handle the challenges they face: ‘My strength and inspiration comes from God. Without prayer and my faith, I could not do this!’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘I stay strong by the grace of God!’ (Mother of TM, 8-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Many mothers discussed how they keep a positive attitude and rely on their internal strength to handle the struggles they face as well as strength from other parents: ‘To take care of him, I had to learn to accept him and accept that he had problems. This helped make things easier’ (Mother of MS, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘I spend time with other parents to talk and think positively.’ (Mother of FH, 4-year-old child with spinal muscle atrophy)

External strategies are outward actions, which mothers described they employ in an attempt to address the barriers they experience when they engage their children in home, school or community activities. Mothers described their outward actions as seeking support from other


parents of children with disabilities by organising or joining a support group: ‘I have been reaching out for spiritual support from my church. I joined a support group there that really helps me feel that I am not alone’ (Mother of MI, 19-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘I formed my own support group with other moms of kids with disabilities; now I know that I am not alone!’ (Mother of MS, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Mothers described personal actions such as educating themselves on disability related issues to improve their understanding of their children’s condition: ‘I have been learning about health and nutrition for my son, and what to expect with his conditions and his disability’ (Mother of MS, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Several mothers described how they encourage their children to be more independent such as children being able to dress and feed themselves, and by playing with other children: ‘I tell my son he has to take care of his things, such as putting things away and become more independent!’ (Mother of MA, 2-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘I tell him to “go play” with your friends! Don’t stay at home all day!’ (Mother of MA, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Many mothers address the barriers to participation their children face by seeking more CBR services:

‘I will continue to take my son to rehab to help him with his mobility. I hope they can help him learn to do more and take care of himself, too.’ (Mother of MA, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Expectations for the future Many of the mothers emphasised their expectations in terms of their

children’s future. Most mothers perceived and described their child’s future in terms of their expectation that their child’s abilities will improve: ‘I hope my child will stand and walk in the future’ (Mother of FH, 4-year-old child with spinal muscle atrophy).

In addition: ‘I hope he will become more independent in the future so he can take care of me in my old age’ (Mother of MI, 19-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

When describing these expectations for the future, most of these mothers included their expectations for more intensive CBR services such as teaching their children to walk, to become independent and to provide more therapeutic exercises: ‘He needs more intensive exercises at CBR so that he can walk. If he could walk we could find him a school’ (Mother of


KB, 6-year-old child with brain damage and cerebral palsy). In addition: ‘We need CBR to teach him to become more independent in his ADLs’ (Mother of TM, 8-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Their hopes also included more equipment for their child: ‘I really need a wheelchair to take him out to school and church’ (Mother of FH, 4-year-old child with spinal muscle atrophy).

In addition: ‘I would like a conventional wheelchair with a tray for him to write on’ (Mother of DB, 15-year-old child with spina bifida).

Most mothers hope that CBR staff will assist them with finding and funding their child’s education including tertiary education and eventually to find employment for their child: ‘I would like to have CBR place him in a school that meets his needs’ (Mother of MA, 10-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘I need CBR to help pay for his schooling’ (Mother of MP, 11-year-old child with spina bifida); and ‘I want him to go to college and for CBR to provide assistance for that.’ (Mother of SM, 21-year-old child with cerebral palsy)

Many mothers had a positive outlook in terms of their children’s future and described how they look forward to ongoing emotional and financial support from support groups hosted by the CBR: ‘We really appreciate the emotional support from CBR staff. Although our son no longer needs therapy, we would appreciate on-going emotional support for our son’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

In addition: ‘My family and I need help with our outlook on the future. I am not sure what to expect’ (Mother of PP, 11-year-old child with cerebral palsy).

Some mothers described a bleak outlook for their child’s future describing how they are worried that their child might never become independent and that he or she will be a burden for the rest of their life.

Discussion and recommendations The mothers in this study described their child’s activities as very

basic and mostly taking place at home with few social activities and recreation activities taking place.

Acceptance by family, friends and community Mothers in this study described both how acceptance or rejection of

their children by family, friends and the community impacts positively and negatively on their children’s social participation.

Recommendations for community-based rehabilitation


These findings suggest CBR programmes might create family and community education programmes to inform and educate entire communities on the causes and implications of living with a disability. Further, such programmes involve ways of teaching community members how to support and encourage a household of a child with a disability in terms of how to be child-centred, and to help the mother engage their child in activities that are beneficial to the child’s development. If communities are made aware of the difficulties associated with living with a disability, children with disabilities and their families may have a greater chance of being accepted and thus enhance children with disabilities’ social participation and quality of life.

Schools and future education Although inclusive education is part of the Romanian government’s

educational policy, in compliance with EU norms, about 10 % of the children in this study did not attend school. A shortage of accessible educational services in terms of children with disabilities was a major concern of all the interviewed mothers; most of them look to CBR to assist them in advocating for accessible schools and financial support for their children’s education.

Physical burden Mothers of children with disabilities described the physical burden of

carrying their children and how this creates a barrier to taking their children to school, church or in engaging in other community activities.

Recommendations for community-based rehabilitation CBR programmes might consider teaching advocacy skills to families

of children with disabilities to encourage families to be more proactive and to take responsibility for securing educational opportunities for their children. Further, the study observes that CBR staff members are expected to consider advocating for and with families of children with disabilities in an effort to include children with disabilities in Romanian education system.

Livelihood activities are part of this CBR programme. However, some mothers seek different types of livelihood activities other than those offered to them by CBR. A good example is the making of crafts or tailoring which they can do at home whilst caring for their children. CBR programmes should consider expanding livelihood programming to meet the needs of mothers who need to be at home all day because of their children’s conditions.


The study established that most of the children with disabilities who participate in CBR services had already received wheelchairs where appropriate. Yet, mothers expressed a desire for the CBR to purchase suitable wheelchairs for their children that can withstand the rough terrain of village roads. It might be useful for CBR to consider the following questions:

- Is it realistic to upgrade mobility equipment as a child grows older?

- Are there other nongovernmental organisations to assist in addressing equipment needs?

Financial burden and family income Most mothers discussed their limited family income as a barrier to

their children’s social participation. Some mothers depend on family members to help pay school and medical fees. All the mothers involved in this study seek access to education programmes and general opportunities for their child that would normally be denied to their children because these opportunities cost too much money.

Support groups and emotional support for mothers Most mothers described CBR as a strong support for their child’s

social participation. Yet, many mothers described themselves as a barrier to their child’s social participation; these mothers feel emotionally insecure and lack basic skills needed to help their child engage and participate in developmental activities.

Findings suggest that mothers need a stronger support system. CBR might consider providing emotional and spiritual support system for mothers by expanding the support group and networks through collaborating with local churches and faith communities. Another way might be to expand the community health worker roles and responsibilities to include educating and mentoring mothers.

Implications for future research This research points to the need for a broad-based study to explore

patterns of social participation of children with disabilities in Romania as well as the barriers and supports for social participation and effective strategies for mothers to help their children overcome these barriers. Researchers might also study contexts in which inclusive education is enforced in Africa and effective strategies to reach that goal so that all


children with disabilities might have access to education that meets their needs.

Limitations of the study Limitations in this study include a small sample size and unequal

distribution of gender amongst the interviewed mothers of children with disabilities. Another limitation is that the conclusions are not generalisable as a result of the small sample size.

Some qualitative researchers argue that validity is not applicable to qualitative research and, at the same time, realise the need for a qualifying check or measure for their research9. The quotations from participants validate the themes. The meanings found in the data and in the conclusions were based on evidence. The researchers used a systematic, analytic approach to uncover an accurate representation of the data collected. The rigour of this study is reflected in the use of reflexivity, particularly visible in the primary investigator who sought constant input in terms of the data analysis process and coding from the local co-researcher.

Conclusion This study is significant in that it is one of only a few studies that

explored the level of support received and/or offered and barriers experienced in terms of social participation for children with disabilities in Romania. CBR staff might consider teaching advocacy skills to all stakeholders of children with disabilities including families and communities, but especially to the children’s mothers. CBR staff might further consider collaborating with mothers and community stakeholders in an effort to develop policies that are holistic, child-centred and address the challenges experienced by children with disabilities and their families. Together, mothers can advocate for effective policies, inclusive education, and thus stronger families, communities and schools, focussing on inclusion for all.

REFERENCES Anne Marie Witchger Hansen, Musonde Siame, Judith van der Veen,

(2015), Health of mothers of children with intellectual disability or autism spectrum disorder: A review of the literature, Medical Research, Issue 3.

9 Winter, G., ‘A comparative discussion of the notion of validity in qualitative and

quantitative research’, The Qualitative Report 4(3), 4, 2000, 143-145.


Cojocaru, V., (2003), "Social Vulnerability and Intervention" in Neamţu, G. Treaty social assistance, Iaşi, Polirom (eds.).

Dumitru, Andrei, (2016), Physical Therapy Pediatrics version. Theoretical and applied SITECH Publishing, Craiova.

Gherguţ, Alois, (2005), Summaries of Special Psycho - Guide for exams and competitions obtain academic degrees, Iasi: Polirom.

Harding, J., Harding, K., Jamieson, P., Mulally, M., Politi, C., Wong-Sing, E. et al., (2009), ‘Children with disabilities’ perceptions of activity participation and environments: A pilot study’, Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy 76.

Law, M., King, G., King, S., Kertoy, M., Hurley, P., Rosenbaum, P. et al., (2006), ‘Patterns and predictors of recreational and leisure participation for children with physical disabilities’, Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology 48(5). Patton, M.Q., (2002), Qualitative research and evaluation methods, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks.

Popa Doiniţa, Sava Aurora, (2007), European Practice in school and professional inclusion of pupils with SEN. Galati: Galati School.

Winter, G., (2000), ‘A comparative discussion of the notion of validity in qualitative and quantitative research’, The Qualitative Report 4(3), 4.


CONSTANTIN IPSILANTI’S CONTRIBUTIONS TO OTTOMAN MILITARY REFORM

ZEYNEP SÖZEN

[email protected]

Abstract: "After Sultan Selim III’s accession to the Ottoman throne in

1798, further changes in military education were introduced by the institution of a new school: Mühendishane-i Cedide (New Engineering School) or Mühendishane-i Sultani (Imperial School of Engineering). Along with the formerly established Mühendishane-i Bahr-i Hümayun (Imperial School of Naval Engineering), the schools constituted the core of the Istanbul Technical University. Deeply rooted in science and military technology,promoting scientific education and housing a library imported from France, both schools departed from the traditional madrasas. The printing press, established by İbrahim Müteferrika in 1727 contributed to the reform process by printing translations on science, technology, mathematics and military technology. Constantine Ipsilanti‘s translations of Marquis de Vauban’s Works upon the orders of the new Sultan are considered the first scientific translations and earned him the title of Grand Dragoman of the Porte in 1796.”

Keywords: Ottoman military technology, Ottoman education, Constantin

Ipsilanti, translators in the Ottoman Empire, Vauban. I. Selim’s educational reforms Sultan Selim III was under immense pressure when he acceded the

Ottoman throne in 1789. Wars against Austria and Russia had been raging for years. Selim’s period is marked by military and educational reforms, which were, in fact interrelated in the sense that Selim’s educational establishments not only departed from the traditional madrasa system, but also aimed to modernize the naval and the land forces. The educational model in Selim’s new establishments drew heavily on the French military literature for inspiration and therefore, translation of major military sources was of utmost importance for the success of

Prof. PhD., Istanbul Medipol University, Head of Department of Architecture,

School of Fine Arts, Design and Architecture, Istanbul.


Selim’s planned reforms. This paper will refer to Constantin Ipsilanti’s contributions to Selim’s military reform process with his translations of Marquis de Vauban’s works, which were highly valued and rewarded by the Sultan.

1.1. The new schools of the new Sultan Educational reforms date back to an earlier period: Mustafa III (r.

1757- 1774), after the naval defeat at Çeşme, which, according to Mikaberidze was the “worst naval defeat of the Ottomans since Lepanto in 1571”1 had established the Imperial School of Naval Engineering (Mühendishane-I Bahri-i Hümayun) and had modernized the artillery corps. The School was intended for the education and training of ship builders and cartographers. The Imperial School of Naval Engineering had become inactive by the time of Selim’s accession to the throne, however.

Influenced by the French revolution, Sultan Selim initiated a “New Order” (Nizam-i-Cedid), which was a comprehensive program of political, economic, military and educational reforms. The term later came to refer to the new regular army introduced by Selim.

Selim took bold steps in education. The Imperial School of Naval Engineering that had been founded in 1775 was reformed, and in 1795 the Imperial School of Military Engineering (Mühendishane-i Berri-i Hümayun) opened. The latter aimed to educate sappers, artillery men and bombardiers. The Military Engineering School had a mathematical syllabus resembling that of the Naval Engineering School, but with an additional syllabus on the science of fortifications.

The Naval and the Military Engineering Schools marked a turning point in Turkish educational history. The new system was the first phase in modernization and institutionalization of higher education2. The two schools departed from the classical madrasa system in the sense that there was a structured educational system with formal classes, formal examination procedures and students sitting in rows while listening to lectures3. The schools adopted a scientific syllabus, focusing on engineering and sciences and their applications in engineering. Both

1 Mikaberidze, A., Conflict and Conquest in the Islamic World, in A Historical Encyclopaedia, Vol. I, ABC-CLIO, LLC, California, 2011, p. 243.

2 Kenan, S., Türk Eğitim Düşüncesi ve Deneyiminin Dönüm Noktaları üzerine bir Çözümleme, in Osmanlı Araştırmaları, ISAM, Istanbul, 2013, p. 11.

3 Ibid., p.12


schools were to form the nuclei of the present day Istanbul Technical University.

1.2. Selim and the library Selim III was deeply interested in the work of Sebastien le Prestre de

Vauban (1633- 1707), who is considered to be the greatest engineers in history. As a young prince, Selim had written a treatise on artillery himself4. Selim’s deep interest in books exhibited itself in his revitalization of the printing press, which was originally founded in 1727 by İbrahim Müteferrika, a Hungarian renegade, during the Tulip Age. The Müteferrika press had luckily survived the bloody rebellion instigated by Patrona Halil in 1730. The activities of the press had slowed down, yet continued until Müteferrika’s death in 17455. Selim was personally involved in the acquisition of the press from its owners Ahmet Vasıf Efendi and Beylikçi Raşid Efendi for the use of the new military school.6 For the first time in Turkish history, the press was to be used for school education.7

The Imperial School of Military Engineering thus became the first university in Turkey that was endowed with a library. The first library regulations in Turkey were prepared in 1797. The first books were either brought from the Treasury of Enderun, procured from other libraries or bought from the estates of private library owners. 177 volumes of very precious books, together with 300 maps and technical tools for instance, were transferred from the private library of Ebubekir Ratıp Efendi, the Ottoman envoy to Austria8.

The library also owned a the Diderot/ D’Alembert encyclopaedia with 35 volumes (Encyclopédie ou dictionnaire raissoné des sciences, des arts et des métiers).9

4 Berkes, N., The Development of Secularism in Turkey, Taylor and Francis, New York,

1998, p. 76. 5 Gencer, Y., İbrahim Müteferrika and the Age of the Printed Manuscript, Indiana

University, Indiana, 2008, p. 155. 6 Ibid., p. 183. 7 Kenan, S., cited works, p. 12. 8 Sakal, F., 2000. The Book in Ottoman Family in http://www.islamicmanuscripts.info/reference/articles/Cicek-2000-Civilisation-

4/Cicek-2000-Civilisation-4-1-897-903-Sakal.pdf. 9 Encyclopédie ou dictionnaire raissoné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, éditée

de 1751 à 1772 sous la direction de Diderot et D’Alembert, http://www.lexilogos.com/encyclopedie_diderot_alembert.htm


II. Constantin Ipsilanti’s scientific translations While we now know that the office of the Grand Dragoman of the

Porte served as a spring board for the thrones of Wallachia and Moldavia, we are not well informed about the precise career path that led to the office of the Grand Dragoman. A plain dragoman’s services included the translations of official documents and interpretation during official visits. However, we do not have enough information about the recruitment processes of the dragomans. What we do know, however, is that the dragomans were fluent in foreign languages and most of them came from prominent Phanariot families. According to Philliou, the dragoman’s job scope was far wider than that of an ordinary interpreter: “In order to translate between Ottoman Turkish and French, for instance, they had to master the cultural and political language and norms of each context, not just the grammar and vocabulary.“10

We also happen to know more about the promotion criteria for the office of the Grand Dragoman of the Porte. These criteria included “fluency in French”, “scientific translation and writing abilities”, “decency”, “care“, “loyalty” ,”clean record” among others.11

2.2. Ipsilanti as a plain dragoman In any case, Constantin Ipsilanti’s credentials were more than

sufficient to serve as a dragoman. He was well known for his knowledge of foreign languages, especially French, which was to become the language of the elite. Ipsilanti seems to be active as a dragoman as early as 1784 during the reign of Abdülhamid I. He was only 24 at that date and was required by the Porte to translate two important petitions by General Chotzy, an Austrian official who had taken refuge in the Ottoman Empire. One of these was a letter of application to the Ottoman Empire and the other was a memorandum. In his letter of application, written in Italian, the general was asking for a grant of asylum. The memorandum, on the other hand, was written in French and contained a list of recommendations for the Ottoman Empire. In short, General Chotzy was advising the Porte to ally with Prussia against the ongoing threat posed by Austria and Russia. Ipsilanti not only translated these two documents,

10 Philliou, C., The Paradox of Perceptions: Interpreting the Ottoman Past through the

National Present, in Middle Eastern Studies, Vol.44, No.5, 2008, p.663. 11 Balcı, S., Osmanlı Devletinde Tercümanlık ve Bab-ı Ali Tercüme Odası, PhD. Thesis,

Ankara Üniversitesi, Ankara, p.67.


but was also required to prepare a critical commentary on the general’s propositions. In his commentary, Ipsilanti expressed his reservations about the recommendations, referring to various aspects of political equilibrium in Europe. Ipsilanti went on to comment on the various difficulties the Ottoman Empire would have to face should the Porte decide to ally with Prussia as suggested by General Chotzy and pointed out the weaknesses of the Ottoman administrative system. In summary, Ipsilanti was against a potential alliance with Prussia as he had emphasized in his “previous essays” written for the attention of the Porte.12

(For a full discussion of this interesting critique and full texts of translations see Beydilli, Kemal, Bonnaval’in İzinde: Muhtedi Osman Bey veya Avusturyalı Firari General Karlo de Kotzi, The Journal of Ottoman Studies, XI, İstanbul, 1991, pp.73-99).

The foregoing illustrates the complexity of the role of the ordinary dragoman and the confidence placed in the dragoman’s perspectives. In addition to translation, the dragoman was also expected to provide political and military consultancy services at the highest level.

2.3. Ipsilanti’s Vauban translations Shortly after Selim’s accession to the throne, Ipsilanti was asked

personally by the Sultan to translate three works by Sebastien Prestre de Vauban. Selim was especially interested in the science of fortifications as “dispensed by Vauban”.13

The first one of these, Fenn-i Harb (Science of War) was printed in 1792-1793. The original title of the book is “De l’attaque et de la défense des places”. Some historical sources attribute the book to Bernard Forest de Belidor (1698-1761), an expert in the field of hydraulics. The second book translated for Selim III by Ipsilanti is titled Fenn-i Lağım (Science of Mining), printed in 1792. The original French title is “Traité des Mines”. The translation by Ipsilanti is probably from the 1726 Paris edition. The third book, Fenn-i Muhasara (Science of the Siege), was printed in 1794. All of the books contain figures and drawings by two Armenian artists, Kapril and Istefan, about whom we know very little.

12 Beydilli, K., Bonnaval’in İzinde: Muhtedi Osman Bey veya Avusturyalı Firari General

Karlo de Kotzi, in The Journal of Ottoman Studies, XI, Istanbul, 1991, p. 83. 13 Ingram, E., Anglo-Ottoman Encounters in the Age of Revolution: The Collected Essays

of Allan Cunningham, Routledge, London and new York, 1993, p. 80.


We have sufficient evidence to conclude that these translations were held in high esteem by the Sultan. First of all, we know that Sultan Selim advised a vizier departing for Egypt to read these books in preparation for encounters with the French.14 Second, the translations were kept in the Topkapı Palace Library, indicating the importance ascribed to the translations What is more interesting, perhaps, is the fact that these books were decorated with early versions of the Ottoman coat of Arms. (The official Ottoman coat of Arms was to be designed about a century later by Abdülhamid II in 1882). In fact, the first book ornamented with an early version of the Ottoman coat of arms happened to be Fenn-i Harb. On the cover of the book, we can see a shield decorated by flowers and surrounded by a flag, a lance, a cannon, a rifle, a bow and a quiver, a spade and a pick axe.15 According to Özdemir, the books were designed for the training of the Nizam-ı Cedid (New Order) soldiers and the manuscripts were reviewed and probably edited by Selim III himself for the figures and drawings before they were printed.16

Ipsilanti also wrote prefaces for the translations: Fenn-i Harb was a complete translation, while Fenn-i Lağım was abridged.17 The Vauban translations thus became an integral part of the official curriculum of the Imperial School of Military Engineering. In addition to their important military content, the translations were evaluated for the translation skills they embodied. Ipsilanti’s personal preference was üslub-u mergub, the “prestigious” or “preferred style”.18

The Vauban translations are considered to be the first scientific translations “in its real sense”19 This was a delicate matter, of course, as Selim was preoccupied not only with the acquisition of knowledge, but also with its application and operation. Ipsilanti must have had a broad knowledge of the highly technical subject matter as well as a broad imagination to visualize the complex processes that had to be conveyed, assuming that he had no practical experience in mining and sieges.

14 Strauss, J., La Tradition Phanariote et l’Art de la Traduction, in Istanbul et les langues

orientales: Actes du colloque organise par l’IFEA et l’INALCO, Varia Turcica, XXVI, Istanbul, 1995, p.398.

15 Özdemir, K., Osmanlı Arması, in Popüler Tarih Dergisi, İstanbul, 2000, p. 44. 16 Ibid. 17 Strauss, J. cited works, p.394. 18 Ibid., page 393. 19 Tekir, Ü., Strategies to Overcome Challenges in Technical Translation, M.A. Thesis,

Atılım Üniversitesi, Ankara, p.13.


The development of Turkish as a language of science was one of Selim’s strategic goals. The translation of complex engineering texts contributed to the development of Turkish scientific terminology or a Turkish scientific „repertoire”.20

III. Conclusions The significance of Ipsilanti’s scientific translations for the successful

implementations of Selim’s reform plans is beyond doubt. The translations not only contibuted to military reforms, but also to the development of Turkish as a scientific language. Undoubtedly, the Sultan appreciated Ipsilanti’s services to this strategic plans. In 1796, Constantin Ipsilanti was promoted to the office of the Grand Dragoman, ultimately leading to the thrones of Moldavia (1799-1802) and Wallachia (1802-1806).

Fortunately the schools, together with their valuable acquisitions, survived the following tumultuous times to evolve into the modern Istanbul Technical University.

REFERENCES Balcı, S., Osmanlı Devletinde Tercümanlık ve Bab-ı Ali Tercüme Odası,

PhD. Thesis, Ankara Üniversitesi, Ankara. Berkes, N., (1998), The Development of Secularism in Turkey, Taylor and

Francis, New York. Beydilli, K., (1991), Bonnaval’in İzinde: Muhtedi Osman Bey veya

Avusturyalı Firari General Karlo de Kotzi, in The Journal of Ottoman Studies, XI, Istanbul. Gencer, Y., (2008), İbrahim Müteferrika and the Age of the Printed Manuscript, Indiana University, Indiana.

Ingram, E., (1993), Anglo-Ottoman Encounters in the Age of Revolution: The Collected Essays of Allan Cunningham, Routledge, London and New York.

Kenan, S., (2013), Türk Eğitim Düşüncesi ve Deneyiminin Dönüm Noktaları üzerine bir Çözümleme, in Osmanlı Araştırmaları, ISAM, Istanbul.

Mikaberidze, A., (2011), Conflict and Conquest in the Islamic World, in A Historical Encyclopaedia, Vol. I, ABC-CLIO, LLC, California.

Mühendishane-I Berr-i Hümayun, İslam Ansiklopedisi V. 10, (1994), TDV, Istanbul.

20 Özmen, C., Translating Science in the Ottoman Empire: Translator-educators as

„Agents of Change” in the Ottoman Scientific Repertoires (1789-1839), The Journal of Ottoman Studies, Isam, 2016, pp. 143-170.


Özdemir, K., (2000), Osmanlı Arması, in Popüler Tarih Dergisi, Istanbul, 24 (144).

Özmen, C., (2016), Translating Science in the Ottoman Empire: Translator-educators as „Agents of Change” in the Ottoman Scientific Repertoires (1789-1839), The Journal of Ottoman Studies, Isam, Istanbul.

Philliou, C., (2008), The Paradox of Perceptions: Interpreting the Ottoman Past through the National Present, in Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 44, No. 5.

Sakal, F., (2000), The Book in Ottoman Family in http://www.islamicmanuscripts.info/reference/articles/Cicek-2000-

Civilisation-4/Cicek-2000-Civilisation-4-1-897-903-Sakal.pdf Strauss, J., (1995), La Tradition Phanariote et l’Art de la Traduction, in

Istanbul et les langues orientales: Actes du colloque organise par l’IFEA et l’INALCO, Varia Turcica, XXVI, Istanbul.

Tekir, Ü., Strategies to Overcome Challenges in Technical Translation, M.A. Thesis, Atılım Üniversitesi, Ankara.

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